Forged in Ice 2
by Veltzeh
Summary: An interesting chain of events starts with a vacation from Briggs. Envy goes suspiciously far in making a friend and finds itself defying Olivier Armstrong. (This story happens after Forged in Ice.) Updates on Saturdays of odd weeks.
1. Vacation

**Author notes:** This story assumes that readers know what happens in the Fullmetal Alchemist manga (or the 2009 anime version, Fullmetal Alchemist Brotherhood) and my other fan fiction story _Forged in Ice_. This story is for non-commercial entertainment purposes only. Fullmetal Alchemist and the characters and places from it belong to Hiromu Arakawa.

* * *

The transmutation circle had glowed. The steel bolt had melted. Envy was exhilarated.

The morning after its successful transmutation, Envy made its way through the corridors of Fort Briggs that had become familiar to it over the three months it had been there. It headed for Major General Olivier Armstrong's office.

As soon as Envy had gotten into the office and closed the door behind it, she got to the point. "So, what was this blather about you and your soul and why the hell was it so important that you had to burst in here in the middle of the night to shout about it?" she asked, sounding laconic.

"It was just that, SIR. I have a soul now. As far as I've understood, Father created us homunculi from Philosopher's Stone and fragments of his own soul, or he just made magnificent minds for us, I don't know. But that night I was going through my Stone so I could see how much energy there was and I found this small empty soul thing. That's MY soul."

Armstrong stared at Envy. "How do you know it's yours?"

"How do you know you're you?"

"Why is it so significant that you have your own soul? All humans have one. Your soul may be unique like everyone else's, but it isn't like you're unique just because of the virtue of having your own soul."

"Would you be asking that if you had never had a whole soul of your own?"

"I can see some alchemists being wild about that and using you as a guinea pig for whatever tests, but is your having a soul in ANY way significant to me?" She sounded demandingly irritated by now.

Envy made an angry face. "I guess not! Thanks a lot, now I know better than to tell you about my great achievements. And I am not secretly drawing a human transmutation circle inside Fort Briggs's maintenance shafts and forcing Shrike to activate it!"

Armstrong turned a keen eye at Envy's oddly specific and unwarranted denial. "Good. You can go."

"Fine!" Envy turned and walked to the door.

Armstrong realised that what she had said was basically a permit for Envy to not tell about possible important issues. She was not so restrained as to not correct herself. "You can tell me about your achievements. Just don't do so at night."

"Hmph, sir. See if I do." Envy left.

Armstrong did not like the reply or its tone but thought that she could just question Envy or other people it was closer to if it seemed like something was up.

Envy smirked to itself. While it had told her about its complete soul, it had not shared and did not want to share the accomplishment that had followed from that realisation. And if Envy could have its way, she would never know, except maybe when it was too late.

What Envy had thought was that if it had a complete soul like a human, it ought to have a Gate and thus be able to perform alchemy. It had tried transmuting and to its surprise, it had succeeded.

Or perhaps it had always been able to perform alchemy. It had never tried before.

* * *

Some weeks went by as Envy experimented with basic alchemy on its own, reshaping small items of simple materials. When it started getting frustrated with progressing too slowly, it went through the small library of Fort Briggs and found a few books about the very basics of alchemy. It read them, continued its experiments and progressed further.

Envy did all of its learning in secret. It did not even tell about its doings to Shrike, who was the human closest to it. Shrike would most likely try to keep the secret if Envy asked him to, but if Armstrong asked him about it, he would certainly spill the beans. Envy could not predict what Armstrong would think of it learning alchemy but did not think about her possible reactions very much since it had no reason to tell her or anyone anything.

In addition to learning the basics, Envy also tried to recall the transmutation circle to create a Philosopher's Stone. It could not be quite sure about the composition of the circle and obviously could not test it now, but it wrote down what it remembered nonetheless. After a few days of trying to reconstruct the circle, it thought that it would not be good if somebody saw the drawings in its room, so it destroyed them and instead made an encoded version that looked like ventilation maintenance instructions, other related issues and ranting about stupid humans and their physiological inconveniences. It could have written them in cookbook format like alchemists usually did but it thought that was way too overdone and that some alchemist would figure out the true purpose of the text if it used a well-known encryption method. It hid the book in its room.

Envy had the patience to practise alchemy on its own for over a month. After that it felt that being secretive and doing small stuff like reshaping bolts was just boring and it wanted to practise doing something bigger and more complex. It managed to spend two more weeks by studying and transmuting small but complex pieces: a small broken radio it had salvaged from the communication department's trash and a part of automail it had snatched from the medical room.

Since it needed to study the parts in detail to know what was in them, Envy read a book about optics and learned to shapeshift its eyes and head to work like a crude microscope. It also discovered that it was easy to shapeshift the materials of its body so that it had a perfectly usable tiny transmutation circle on its fingertip, palm or other part of the body.

At the end of August, Envy was fast running out of patience and wanted to try bigger and more elaborate transmutations. However, it could not hope to do that in secret in Fort Briggs. It knew that the other soldiers got time off and went home or visited North City on their free time. It had not needed vacations previously, but now it thought that a vacation would be an ideal time to go to one of the old hideouts of the homunculi and practise some larger-scale alchemy.

First Lieutenant Linke was Envy's commanding officer, and was thus responsible for its schedule. It went to talk to him when it saw him in their squad's lounge. "Hey Linke. Schedule me a vacation some time soon."

"Huh? A vacation?"

"Yeah. You know, that bit of free time everyone but me seems to be getting."

"Oh. Well..." Linke stopped and did not seem to know what to say. He did not mumble and stutter but just stopped talking and frowned at Envy. "I thought you didn't require any."

"So?"

"I suppose I'm asking why you need it."

"To get some change of scenery for a couple of days. Why else?"

"Oh. Hm... I need to clear it with the Major General. She instructed me to not schedule vacations for you."

"Geez."

Envy was not surprised when Armstrong called it to her the next day. They did not meet in her office since she did not use it much now that she had finally concluded the bureaucracy and hiring of new people that had resulted from the events of the Promised Day. Instead, they met in a small corridor.

"Why do you want vacation?" she asked.

"I want to get out of here for a couple of days. Just taking a break from all of you. Don't worry, I won't kill any humans and I'll come back."

"I still need to assign a few people to watch you."

Envy showed an offended face. "What? Why the heck?"

"I would be willing to let you out on your own for a few days but those uptight people in Central and East aren't. If I don't have my people watching over you, they're going to watch you. And I doubt they would 'watch' you."

"You're worried they might kill me?" asked Envy incredulously.

"No, but if there was violence, it would ruin all relations and they would want to lynch you. And all that would just be a reason for that bloody Mustang to come here and pick a fight. Right now it's extremely important for the country that the military cooperates and plays nicely with everything, so that's what I'm doing."

Envy's expression changed to defiantly serious when Armstrong mentioned Mustang. "Why can't that prick leave well enough alone? Darned idiot." Envy huffed before continuing. "It'd be just inconvenient if some soldiers came along. I wasn't planning on hiking around anywhere where humans could move."

"Too bad. I will not let you out by yourself until those folks at Central get a grip on the important issues like not caring about every single thing you do. But I can assign a couple of people you like to go along with you, like Shrike and Linke. Does that sound acceptable to you?"

Envy sighed exasperatedly. "I hate those bloody idiots down there. Fine, I'll go with Linke and Shrike then. Can I have that kind of vacation every week?"

"No."

"Every two weeks?"

"No. Hm, actually yes. The regular soldiers get a week of vacation for every six weeks of work. But you can't get both Linke and Shrike to come with you each time then."

Envy sighed and twisted its mouth in mock-frustration. "Oh, fine."

* * *

After Armstrong had approved it, Linke managed to schedule Envy's vacation on the next week. They packed supplies for two days and left the Fort in a small off-road automobile.

Linke was driving, Shrike sat next to him and Envy occupied the back seat. Envy had told Linke to head down the main road toward North City for now. He and Shrike were content to stay quiet, but since Envy liked to talk, it talked.

"Linke, what have you been up to lately?"

"Pretty much the same as always. Arranging schedules, making strategical analyses and training troops."

"Weren't you on a long vacation a month ago or something?"

"Yes, I went to see my parents in North City."

"Did they have anything interesting to say?"

"Eh, no. They merely grilled me about getting a girlfriend again."

"Heh heh. You're what, thirty-four? You sure ought to have a wife already."

"What, don't you start. It's hard for a man in the military to find a woman."

"It didn't seem like that whenever I went to a bar disguised as a man soldier. Sure enough, some people didn't approve but they were mostly men. A lot of women liked the uniform."

"Perhaps, but I don't wish to be with a woman who sees nothing but the uniform. Or just a companion for a single night."

"You are so needy."

"What? No I'm not."

Envy snickered a little to itself. "I got Humber and Northrop to break up. Did you know that?"

"Oh? I heard they separated, but I didn't know you were behind it."

"No one else knows either!"

"How did you do it?"

"I stalked them a couple of times to see how they behaved with each other, then spent a while posing as them so that they each only saw me for a week. And during those meets I really dropped some interesting lines. When they finally met each other after that week, they fought, stormed off and trashed some photos. Look at this." Envy waved a slightly crumpled photograph at Linke, who glanced at it, startled and made an uncontrolled movement with the wheel, coming close to driving off the road.

"Linke!" exclaimed Shrike as the other man straightened the car. "Envy, you shouldn't distract him while he's driving."

"Ha ha!"

Linke was slightly sweaty. "Good grief! I fancy her but I don't need to see that kind of photograph of her!"

"Relax, I faked it. I don't even know what she looks like beyond the face and uniform. But my guess probably isn't far from the truth, wouldn't you say?" It showed the "photo" to Shrike who blushed.

"Uh... Uh, how would I know?" asked Shrike in a small voice.

"You wouldn't," replied Envy and melded the picture back to its own body with a tiny red crackle. "Are you going to try wooing her?" it asked from Linke.

"Well... yes, it's just that the break-up was just a short time ago and there's this woman in North City I just got acquainted with."

"So date both of them? Northrop is in Briggs, the other one isn't. Should be really easy to keep them apart."

"I suppose, but there is more than enough to handle in one relationship already."

"Aww!" said Envy in an exaggeratedly disappointed tone. "That's lame." Linke sighed. "Why do your parents care so much about your private life?"

"I suppose that is what parents do. However, I've understood that most often the mother is the one who is most eager to inquire every little detail about their child's personal issues. Isn't that so?" he asked from Shrike.

"Er, I don't know."

Linke frowned. "Anyway, in my family my father is the one who really grills me, though of course mother does too. Always the same questions, over and over again. 'Have you met any nice women lately? Been to that bar I told you to visit last time? Are there new interesting lady soldiers in Briggs? Have you visited your sisters? Did you get promoted yet?' It gets on my nerves. Sometimes excessively so. I wish he would stop."

Envy noticed that Shrike looked askance at Linke. "Oh, Shrike? What's your problem?" it asked.

Shrike suddenly lost his defiant expression and became slightly confused. "Uh, w-what? Nothing..."

"You know lying never works on me! Just spit it out. You obviously have something against what he just said."

"What?" said Linke in a somewhat challenging tone and gave Shrike a glance.

Shrike looked out through the side window. "No..."

"No what?"

Shrike did not reply.

Envy was amused. "It's just his daddy issues. See, his mom died and his soldier dad was never home so – –"

Shrike turned and spoke over Envy. "Hey, Envy, stop. I don't want everybody to know all – –"

"– – they never talked much and they haven't... Huh, really, Shrike? I'd hardly say Linke is 'everybody'."

"Uh..."

Linke continued after a short pause. "Okay, I suppose I see your point. Maybe my father and mother's endless inquiries are more pleasant than them being gone altogether."

"Uhm."

Envy was a little disappointed that the two men had not even raised their voices at each other.

"So... your mother died and your father was never home? Who raised you then?" continued Linke.

"Oh... well, he had some friends who also had children and they could take care of me."

"I see. Where did you live?"

"My dad has an apartment."

"So, when you were old enough, you were there just by yourself?"

"Well, yeah."

"What did you do if there were unforeseen problems with the apartment? Or if you needed food?"

"I... uh, went to the landlord. And I went to the store by myself after I turned six."

Linke was baffled. "My parents wouldn't let me and my sisters out alone until we were fifteen!"

"Er, well, the store was only a kilometre away."

"A kilometre! There was no way we could ever do anything like that. Weren't you afraid strangers would rob you or even kill you?"

"Uh... No? I found pretty much everyone rather scary."

Envy found the conversation between the two men tiresome, but by now it was clear that Shrike was uneasy answering Linke's questions and wanted to just stop. That fact was the interesting part of the conversation for Envy, and it wondered when Shrike would stop answering.

"And no one ever robbed you?" Linke went on.

"Some stupid teens did once, but a guard at the store saw it and made them give all their money back to me. I ended up with more money than they had taken."

"What? Didn't you say you had not had that much money?"

"No."

"Why?"

"I was kind of frozen."

Linke was bewildered. "Where did you even get that money if your father was always gone?"

"Er, he left me a pile of it and said I could use it to pay for food and bills."

"A... pile?"

"It was usually about a hundred thousand cen..."

"Hundred th-bwuh-huh-what?"

Envy snorted rather loudly at Linke's stuttering. It was all the more comical because Linke normally did not stutter at all.

Linke seemed to block the information from his conscious mind and went on about another issue. "Didn't the store personnel ever wonder why a kid came to the store alone all the time?"

"I guess they did... They asked questions like where I lived but I didn't really answer them much. They gave me candy sometimes but after I told them I could only eat candy on Saturday, they only gave it to me on Friday and told me to save it for tomorrow."

"This is unbelievable. Are you trying to trick me or something?"

"What?" Shrike spoke no more and turned to look out through the side window.

"No way was that a lie. He's being completely serious," commented Envy.

"But... all that responsibility for taking care of yourself must have been difficult. I find it hard to believe a child could do that. And a child, given money and free reign of a store, would buy the shelves empty of cookies."

"Why?"

"Why...? That's what kids do! They crave everything sugary and can eat such stuff nearly endlessly. I sure did when I was a kid." Shrike did not answer. "Shrike?"

Shrike turned away from the side window and faced the windscreen again. "What?"

Linke held a short pause. "Well?"

"Um... If you're waiting for a reply, I just don't have anything to say."

Linke frowned but said nothing for now.

* * *

The sceneries changed dramatically as they drove. The vicinity of Fort Briggs was snowy and naturally devoid of trees and other plants, but it did not take a long trip until the first bushes and small trees appeared. The winding road took them down from the mountains and into a flat valley where the trees quickly turned taller.

When they were approximately half the way from North City, Envy told Linke to turn to a side road. They drove altogether about four hours. For the last half an hour, they were not on a road or even a path.

At some point, Envy told Linke to stop, hopped out of the car and seemed satisfied, though the part of the forest looked pretty much just like it had looked an hour ago: mostly coniferous trees, little undergrowth and a few now colourful deciduous trees.

"So, we're in the middle of nowhere," said Shrike.

"What are we going to do here?" asked Linke from Envy.

"I sure don't know about you. I know what I'm going to do, I'm going to shapeshift, run over there and come back at nightfall."

"What? Armstrong said we should stay together – –"

"I don't care about what she said. I told her I wouldn't kill humans or do anything else she'd find morally questionable and that's going to be enough. You two might be tolerable but right now I really don't want a couple of humans dragging me down." It shapeshifted into a horse and did it subtly enough to leave the clothes it was wearing lying relatively neatly on the ground. "So long then. Do what you want. And pick those up," it said and pointed at the clothes with a hoof. Having done that, it turned and ran straight into the forest with unnatural speed.

Linke and Shrike stared after it, silent from the surprise and a little disturbed at how the horse had spoken with Envy's voice.

"Well, you know, it's not like there was anything we could've done," said Shrike finally and started collecting Envy's clothes.

"That wasn't... We were supposed to keep an eye on Envy."

"Yeah... I just hope Armstrong won't ask anything about this trip."

"Why would you wish for that?"

"So I don't have to lie about this."

"Why would you lie?"

"Well... I wouldn't, I'm a terrible liar, but I don't want to get Envy into trouble. I mean, if it doesn't go near humans or even look like one, who's going to know?" Shrike put Envy's clothes into the car.

Linke sighed. "You won't need to worry about it. I will tell her everything."

Shrike was visibly displeased and even worried but turned his face down and said nothing.

"You don't agree with me, do you? The Major General told us that Envy could be dangerous and that it would be dangerous if he was seen or went off on his own. That should be enough to report to her as truthfully as we can so she can take whatever action is necessary."

"Uh."

Now Linke was displeased and held a pause. "Are you... acting that way because you're in love with him?"

Shrike blushed and continued looking down. "Maybe..."

"You know relationships shouldn't affect our work."

Now Shrike grew rather nervous and thought whether it really was true that he was letting his attachment to Envy affect his work. Technically their current trip was vacation, but Armstrong's commands did make it work. "I, um... Yeah, I agree. I-I'll try better to not let it affect work..."

"Do you agree with me that we need to inform Armstrong about this, then?"

"...Yeah."

"Good. Nevertheless, this situation isn't too worrisome since he is just running in the forest looking like a horse, so let's wait for him to come back." Shrike nodded. "So, what do you want to do? I rather feel like running myself, after that long driving trip. Or would you like to do some close combat training?"

"Oh... uh, I'm really not good at it."

"I'm not that great at it either. We're almost the same size so we should be better matched."

Shrike looked at Linke. "Hm, yeah, I guess. Well... I guess I could," he said rather unenthusiastically.

The two men got ready, stretched a little and spent some twenty minutes wrestling. Shrike lost each round, though for once he had had a few good moments and had almost managed to hold Linke down long enough to lock him. They then sat on a fallen tree to rest.

"You weren't kidding at all when you said you're not good at this," said Linke. Shrike did not reply. "Doesn't First Lieutenant Massena teach you how to fight properly?"

"Um, she does, but I have a really hard time learning." Shrike looked rather sullenly at the ground for a moment. "But... you know, at least I could almost stop you, I've never managed to do that except to this small woman who was in my unit three years ago. She was pretty much the only one I've ever managed to beat since coming to Briggs anyway. And I know I shouldn't have, but I felt so bad after that. I was glad she switched units later."

Linke looked at Shrike somewhat curiously. "You quite dislike fighting, don't you?"

"I do..."

"That is an odd quality for someone in the military."

"Well... Well, since you know about my dad know, you can just blame him for that too. He made me join the military."

"It appears you don't have much respect for him. Is it just because he was not there when you grew up?"

"Uh... I don't... I just don't really know him. I can't say if I respect him or not."

Linke looked even more curious. "Didn't you ever try to get reacquainted with him? It is easier to relate to adults as an adult."

"Sort of... but he's a quiet person and so am I. I didn't really know what to say and I imagine he felt the same."

"Don't you even have some common interest?"

"I don't know..."

Linke seemed surprised. "Right... Listen, I'm not ordering you around or telling you how to live your life, but you really should try to get more in touch with him and try to find some common ground. Having good relations with one's family is beneficial."

"Uh, I guess."

Linke felt a draft on his thigh and felt the spot with his hand, finding that his trousers had a rather wide tear on the side. "What? Darnit, I must have torn the fabric at some point." Shrike glanced at the tear while Linke inspected it and found that he had a scratch on his skin, but at least there was no blood. "You don't happen to have a needle and thread with you, do you?"

"Uh, no... But... I could try fixing it another way."

"Another way?"

"I can do a little alchemy."

"What? Really?" Linke sounded rather astonished.

"Um, if you don't want to, I won't... There's probably a sewing kit in the car."

"No, I meant that you've never mentioned that before. Isn't it very useful?"

"Well... yes, but I'm not that good at alchemy either, I can just do simple stuff."

"What do you do with it?"

"Uh... Mostly I fuse patches on pipes and transform misshaped bits into a better condition."

"And you can fix my trousers?"

"Well, I've done similar stuff with the overcoats before. Just... I need to draw a transmutation circle first..." Shrike walked to the car and took a sketchpad out of his bag. He then sat down and spent a few moments drawing an appropriate circle. "That should be it. Oh... I'd ask you to take the pants off first, I don't think it's safe if your leg is so close."

Linke spent a while untying his shoes and eventually handed his trousers to Shrike. Shrike placed the paper on the ground with the trousers and transmuted. The tear in the fabric puckered up and became seamless again, though the spot of the transmutation had a few barely visible alchemical flaws and felt more plastic-like since Shrike did not know the original fabric's exact weave pattern.

"Um... almost as good as new," he said as he gave the trousers back to Linke.

"Thank you. That's great." Linke felt the patched up fabric for a short while and then started dressing again. "Why don't more people know you can do alchemy? Surely you know that it is useful and important. I can think of a few cases where alchemy would have been extremely useful in fixing some issues with the Fort."

Shrike looked down again. "I'm... I'm not that good. This is just a hobby, I don't have time to study much more." He picked the circle up and put it between the sketchpad.

"Even a little alchemy would be useful. Undoubtedly you could scale down your other duties as well and concentrate on alchemy more. Perhaps you could become a state alchemist! That would be an instant promotion to major."

"No, no."

"What? Why not?"

"State alchemists have to study some area of alchemy very intensely and I have no idea for that and besides, there's no way I could take so much responsibility."

Linke was very disappointed and it showed, but of course Shrike did not see it. Linke wanted to interrogate Shrike and push and convince him to be more ambitious. "What a shame! If alchemy is something you want to do, you should pursue that and become part of the elite. Even you have potential, and state alchemists are the best, are they not? Why would you not strive to be one of them?"

Now even Shrike clued in on Linke's disappointment. He had absolutely nothing to reply, so he mumbled at the ground. "There's no way I can be that good and I don't have time..."

"Didn't I just say you could scale down your other duties to study alchemy? Stop belittling yourself, be more ambitious and take charge of your own life."

"...You're telling me how to live right now," commented Shrike quietly and more than a little bitterly.

"And you don't like that, do you? Why do you partake in the close combat training if you don't see any use in it?"

"I don't... Because it's compulsory."

Linke gave out a very frustrated sigh.

"I do wish I could skip it and study alchemy instead. I'm small and I'll never be good at it but I could be a better alchemist."

"Then talk to someone about it already!" said Linke. "Nevertheless, a small stature isn't that much of a hindrance in close combat. Remember that kid, Fullmetal Alchemist Edward Elric? He was in Fort Briggs last year."

"No..."

"No? Really? Well, anyway, when I was in Central, following that huge corruption scandal and the fight that ensued, the final showdown was between this super-alchemist and Edward Elric. He was a fifteen-year-old kid who can't have been even as tall as Envy. Good grief, that kid kept pummelling the super-alchemist until he fell."

"Oh..." Shrike felt annoyed since there probably was no reason for him being a lousy fighter except him having an attitude problem with close combat. He sighed. "I wish learning fighting was easier."

"Few things are easy. You should have a little more ambition! You can become better at fighting if you truly want to and spend the effort."

"I guess. But I probably want other things more. Like practising alchemy."

Linke huffed. "I do hope you actually do something about that. Either way, I am a little interested in what you can do. Would you mind showing me?"

Shrike finally turned his head up to look at Linke. He was wary, obviously not happy with the tone Linke had used with him, but he still did think that the First Lieutenant was not trying to be malignant. "Mhm... I guess not... Is there anything particular you'd like to see?"

* * *

Meanwhile, Envy had run off and as a big snake, slithered back to listen in on what Shrike and Linke had to say about its departure. They had reacted much like it had suspected. It was annoyed that Linke would go and tell Armstrong, but at least he had not panicked and left immediately, which meant that Envy could talk him out of it. Then again, if Armstrong asked them directly what had happened, it figured that neither of the men would lie whether they had promised to not mention Envy's running off or not.

It had planned to look for an abandoned farm nearby where it could practise transmutation, but now it thought again about how Armstrong might react. It came to the conclusion that it might be actually more beneficial to make her think like she had gotten her way. After all, if Envy behaved, there would be no reason for her to deny it having another vacation later. She would probably give Envy permission to go running in the forest on its own. That did mean that Envy would not get to practise alchemy so soon, but at the moment it thought it could wait.

While Linke and Shrike fought, Envy discreetly shapeshifted and moved closer to them so that it eventually looked like a large mound of ground behind the car.

Over six hours passed while nothing much happened. Linke and Shrike spent their time reading (Shrike had a book about alchemy and a novel which he gave to Linke to read), playing a word game (How many words can you think up that end with i? How about a?), eating, peeing, picking berries and exercising.

Once the sun was low enough that the sky was beginning to dim, Linke said that it would be best to put up the tent. He and Shrike went to get the tent out of the car, and that was when Shrike noticed that something was amiss.

"The... uh, this is odd, but I don't remember this mound. We'd have to have circled it or driven over it. But I'm pretty sure we didn't drive over it and maybe that wouldn't be even possible, it's pretty steep... And we can't have circled it either because then the car wouldn't be so close unless you reversed but you didn't do that either."

Linke first looked incredulously at Shrike, but then the message started making sense to him too and he stared at the mound.

"Boo!" said Envy. Both men screamed, dropped the tent parts and Shrike fell down. "Ha ha ha! Ahahaha!" Envy laughed for a short moment and then kept giggling as it finally took its usual shape and original outfit. "It took you so long! SO LONG! After the first three hours I thought I'd have to sit there right into the night!"

Linke managed to get his heart out of his throat first. "H-how did you...? H-how long were you...?"

"The whole time! I only ran far enough to make you think I'd gone off, then sneaked back and became a mound while you fought. I can tell you what you did and talked about if you don't believe me."

Shrike staggered upright.

"Ah... But why did you do it?" asked Linke. "You could have rejoined or even scared us very shortly after going off."

"I pretty much wanted to see how long it would take for you to notice me. You aren't very observant, are you? Be glad I wasn't a Drachman spy! Not that you'd have revealed any secrets, but anyway."

Linke did not quite know whether to be relieved, annoyed or amused and just scratched his head while making a funny face. Shrike tried to calm his breath. Eventually Linke shrugged lightly. "Oh well, it happened. Let's put up the tent." He and Shrike picked up the parts and looked around for a proper spot to put it up. Once they had found one, they cleaned the area a little before erecting the tent. Envy pushed the tent's rope holder pitons into the ground since it could do that effortlessly without tools.

"Is that how you originally looked like?" asked Linke from Envy once the tent was set up.

"Yeah."

"That's an... interesting outfit."

Envy rolled its eyes.

"Well I like it," said Shrike.

Linke glanced a little questioningly at Shrike, but he was mostly just confused at how Envy looked. Envy noticed his uncertainty but was not interested in exploring it.

"I'll just eat a snack and go to sleep. I feel tired," said Linke.

Envy and Shrike joined him to eat but did not yet go to sleep. They sat in the car while Linke crawled into the tent.

"I won't even sleep much. Are you two going to sleep at different times just to keep an eye on me or what?" asked Envy.

"Um... I don't know, probably."

"You know, babysitting me is just stupid."

"Yeah... I agree. It isn't that sensible."

"I can go off whenever I like and there's nothing you can do about it."

"Mh... I-I guess it's more about obeying and getting Armstrong's trust."

Envy sighed, twisted its mouth into an expression of bored disapproval and stared dully forward. "Humans!"

"Uh, sorry... Is there anything you'd like to do?" Envy did not answer. "Well, I have a book with me, you can read that. Here," said Shrike after digging the book out of his bag.

"A novel? I haven't read fiction in a while. Well, unless you count that history book Pride wrote a few decades ago."

"Pride?"

"Never mind."

Shrike lit up a candle and read his alchemy book while Envy made some unsavoury comments about the novel, such as "Idiot!" "What the heck? What do they think it is?" "This writer is a moron." "No! It doesn't work that way!"

Envy was done with the book in two and a half hours. Then it dropped the book on Shrike's lap.

"Ow! Uh... I take you didn't like it."

"Eh. It would've been better if the writer hadn't been such a moron and if there hadn't been so much stupid human drama."

"Er, yeah. Well, is there something else you'd like to do?"

"Hm? Ooh. That book did give me an idea." Envy turned to face Shrike directly and grinned. "We could play a game called 'chase the human'."

"Uh..." While Shrike was by now fairly used to seeing even Envy's creepier expressions, they had not ceased making him very uncomfortable.

"We play it so that you run into the forest in a panic and I change into random monsters and chase you."

"Uhm..." Envy waited until Shrike had something else to say. "I... that doesn't sound very nice to me."

"Come on, I won't really hurt you and if you watch where you're going, you won't trip too badly. You don't have to even care about getting lost, I can locate the camp later."

Shrike stared at Envy suspiciously for a moment but then looked away. Envy waited again; it had learned that Shrike usually gave in if it let him think long. "Eh... o-okay..."

"Ooh, neat! Well then, grab a head lamp and start running. I'll come after you in a while. I'll keep this on my head so you can tell it's me and not some random animal." It pointed at the nodes on its forehead.

Shrike took a lamp and fixed it over his hat while eyeing Envy and looking concerned. He then started off into the forest.

Shrike ran among the trees, twigs, bushes and darkness. At least the nightly insects did not bother him too much since he was running. The light from the head lamp was not very efficient and bounced around distractingly, so he had to be more careful about where he stepped. He was worried about how Envy would attack him.

After a short while, Shrike considered that maybe Envy had only thought up the game to get him out of their campsite and pondered the reasons while still walking forward. He did not come to any conclusion because he heard some fastly approaching rustling. Tense, he turned to look to where the sounds were coming from, but he saw nothing until Envy launched itself from the dark and attacked him as a large snake. Shrike could only let out a muffled gasp as it curled around him. It giggled at him in its snake form as it watched him.

"Come on! Squirm, struggle and flee! What are you waiting for?" said Envy and wiggled its forked tongue at him. It continued giggling and let Shrike get away once he had struggled a bit.

Envy attacked Shrike five more times as a giant squirrel, ghastly bony giant, dragon, tentacle monster and nightmarish tree. By then Shrike was completely spent and as Envy lifted him into the air, restrained in its branches, he did not struggle at all.

"Would you even try? I won't let you get hurt by falling if that's what you're worried about."

"Ah, I-I... Envy, let's just stop... please." Shrike held onto a branch, breathing heavily and not really caring about the tears that fell from his eyes. "I-I hated..." He did not finish.

Envy glared at Shrike, annoyed and thinking how ridiculously weak humans were. And Shrike seemed to be especially weak; Linke would probably have lasted longer. It sighed and took Shrike back down, placing him on a small hollow next to a spruce. It then shapeshifted back into human form and sat down as well, next to another tree. It looked disappointedly at Shrike who tried to stop shaking and heaving. He tried to wipe his eyes dry now that he was pretty much weeping due to relief, but his hands were so dirty that the attempts just made them sting more. Luckily the tears washed the dirt away soon after.

After Shrike had calmed down more, he glanced at Envy and then dried his face by wiping it on his uniform. Then then looked down and apparently nodded off after a couple of minutes.

"Huh? Falling asleep already?" said Envy.

Shrike startled slightly and drew a deep breath quickly. "Mhm... L-let's just go back to the camp..."

"Fine. I'll check the direction." Envy stretched its head toward the sky, disguising it as a thin treetop as it kept growing. Envy spent a short while looking around in the dark before it located the camp. It brought its head back down and stood up.

Shrike stood up onerously.

"That way," it said and started walking.

Shrike followed it but started collapsing after only a few steps. He grabbed Envy's shoulder and held onto it while not trying to fall.

"Hey? What is it with you?" asked Envy, a little annoyed. It turned to face Shrike and he had to lean on it to stay upright.

"Uh... I-I feel dizzy."

"Dizzy? You can't claim that was so demanding, even of your delicate physique." Nevertheless, it let him continue his hugging for now. It also wondered whether something serious had indeed happened during the chase. While it could not quite bring itself to care that much about Shrike's well-being, him being hurt would be troublesome in other ways. "You aren't actually hurt, are you?"

"...N-no, I don't think so. Just... couldn't walk." He slowly let go of Envy and stood unsupported. He looked at it tiredly for a fleeting moment.

"Can you walk now?"

"I think so."

"Good. I would've hated having to carry you." Envy turned and started walking again.

"But... aren't you really strong anyway? Would my weight make a big difference?"

"No. I can carry you just fine. It would just be annoying."

"Uh."

"So, you hated the chase game, eh? Do you understand that in war, that is pretty much what you humans do as soldiers? Either you're chasing something or being chased."

"That's... That's awful."

"You really shouldn't be in the military, you know!"

"I can just stay in the Fort! Nothing will get to us there, and my skills are specifically needed inside, and even in the field I really should just be a mechanic or something..."

"Yeah yeah, blah blah. You little pacifist. Even you should know that you having a skill set not suited to combat won't spare you from fights. But I'll give it to the Fort, inside it is probably the safest place a soldier can be." Envy shrugged.

Even though the walk to the camp was not long because Shrike had run in a some kind of circle, he felt like it took forever since he was so tired. Now that he could think of something else than running and being scared, he also noticed that he was very hungry and thirsty.

Once they had arrived in the camp, he went straight for their food and drink reserve. After he had gotten his worst thirst quenched and hands and face better cleaned, he looked around to see what Envy was doing. He saw it standing next to a young tree. Envy looked at the birch in an assessing manner and then grabbed it, bent and folded it into a more compact shape and finally started eating it.

After a few bites and some powerful munching, Envy spoke. "Well, it's not exactly good, but I've eaten worse stuff." It continued eating the birch and finished before Shrike was done with his food. Envy then wandered a little further and ate some more flora it came across.

Shrike had stared at Envy's doings but thought that he should not be surprised at it eating a tree after seeing it fold and eat a knife.

After a few more evening routines, Envy and Shrike crawled into the tent. Shrike took off some of his clothes and settled in his sleeping bag. Envy had not bothered to take one along.

"Hey, I'm going to make Linke scream a bit. Heh heh," it said as it settled between Shrike and Linke and shapeshifted into a large snake once again.

"Great," mumbled Shrike and barely even looked at Envy as it shapeshifted. He fell asleep.

Envy curled around itself and made sure that its tail circled Linke so that he could not fail to see it when he woke up.

* * *

Unsurprisingly, both Shrike and Envy woke up to Linke screaming in the morning. Envy turned to look and giggle at him, and he understood quickly that the snake was Envy.

Linke sighed in frustration and tried to calm his breathing. "I wish you wouldn't do that."

"Why not? Your reaction was just right. Well, maybe less screaming and more shooting would be better for you, but the main point is that you're afraid of a big snake-looking thing in your tent like any good little human. Sure it makes your heart race for a while, but it's like a workout." Linke did not reply right away, so Envy continued talking. "I'm done sleeping. Ssssslitherrrrr." It squirmed and slithered out of the tent.

"I need to sleep six more hours," mumbled Shrike as he turned and settled again.

Linke mulled for a while as he shed the fear and confusion from his mind. He then put on his clothes and got out of the tent.

The rest of Envy's vacation day went reasonably well. It turned out that Shrike had borrowed the alchemy book he had from a library in North City, so naturally Envy wanted to read it too. Shrike was not sure what to make of Envy reading about alchemy but figured that maybe doing something was better than boredom, and he was glad that Envy did not ask to play "chase the human" again.

* * *

They drove back to Fort Briggs in the evening, and Armstrong called them to her office soon after they had put away the equipment they had borrowed.

"How did this vacation go?" asked Armstrong once the three were in front of her.

"I have no problems to report, sir," said Linke. "We drove about four hours and camped in Hillforest. The first thing Envy did was to trick us to believe he had ran away, but he had actually just disguised as a mound of ground."

Envy snickered.

"Why did you do that?" asked Armstrong.

"Well, first I had planned to just run off for the rest of the day to get to be alone, but then I thought you might get your panties in a knot for that, so I just went back and waited to see how long it took them to notice me. It took them over seven hours! And it was such an obvious disguise. Seriously, a large mound of ground right behind the car. How could you miss it?"

"And can you prove that you were in fact there all that time?"

"Sure. The first thing after I left was that Shrike and Linke talked about telling you about my running off. Then they fought as practice a bit and Shrike lost every time. Then they talked about how bad he is at combat and Shrike fixed a tear in Linke's pants with alchemy and then they argued about Shrike becoming a state alchemist. That was funny, by the way."

Armstrong gave a gather puzzled look at Envy and Shrike.

"Then Shrike showed Linke some little alchemy tricks. He fixed a dent on the car's nose. Then they read some books, Linke read this awful novel about some crime scene investigator and Shrike read, what was it, _Alchemy and Complex Substances_? Then was that word game. It was so boring! Then Shrike peed, then they picked berries – –"

"That's enough."

"Wait, I'm almost done! Then they ate the berries and some more food, talked about something boring that I didn't pay attention to and then exercised."

After a short moment of silence, Linke spoke. "That is what we did, yes. Envy scared us after we noticed the mound. I slept and woke up to seeing a huge snake in the tent. That was Envy too. Today we just loitered about. Shrike and Envy read something and we walked in the forest. Envy ate numerous different things, saying he was testing his digestive system."

"Did you stay awake with Envy during the night?" asked Armstrong from Shrike.

"Yes, sir."

"What did you do?"

"Uh... we played a game. I hated it but we stopped it soon enough."

"What kind of game?"

"I ran in the forest and Envy chased me."

"It was like a simple war simulation," said Envy with a shrug.

Armstrong stared at the three of them silently for a while.

"So, can I have another vacation later?" asked Envy.

"Yes. Linke can schedule them. The arrangement will be similar to this one. Shrike, please remain here. You two can go."

Envy and Linke turned and left.


	2. A Revelation and a Secret

Shrike was somewhat enthusiastic about the idea Linke had given him, so he spoke before Armstrong could bring up her topic. "Sir, there's something I want to ask."

"Go ahead."

"I spoke with Linke about my close combat training because I don't... I'm just not good at it. He said that maybe I could do something else instead, like practise alchemy. Is that possible?"

"Practise alchemy? What for?" Armstrong had in fact wanted to bring up Shrike's alchemy skills since she had not heard about them and was marginally concerned that Envy was trying to manipulate Shrike into studying how to create a Philosopher's Stone.

"Just... just to be better at it, sir. Linke told me that there have been times when alchemy would have been very useful in quickly fixing some things in the Fort."

"From what I understand, studying alchemy is very intense and demands extraordinary dedication. Do you think you can manage that?"

"Yes, I... I studied alchemy more when I was younger so I know the basics, sir."

"You did?"

"Yes, but it was just a hobby."

"What can you do?"

"I can change the shape of simple objects and fuse patches on pipes. I guess I can transmute bigger objects too but I haven't tried."

"Why didn't I know about this before?"

"Um... sorry, sir. I didn't think it was important. I've told a couple other ventilation people that I can do a little alchemy and I asked Second Lieutenant Roma if it was okay that I used alchemy to fuse the patches. He just asked me to show it to him and after he checked that there weren't any issues with the alchemically fused patch, he told me that it was okay."

Armstrong frowned at Shrike.

"I'm sorry, sir, I-I really thought it wasn't that important."

"If that's the most you can do, it probably isn't. Or wasn't. So, you say you would rather advance your studies in alchemy than partake in combat training?"

"Yes, sir."

"That is acceptable. Talk to Massena about it and tell her to schedule less combat training for you. But don't cease all training. If it suits you better, practise close combat more with Linke when you go watch Envy on its vacation."

Shrike was flabbergasted. He could not believe resolving the issue had been this easy.

"We don't have many books on alchemy so you need to buy or borrow those from North City or elsewhere. You can talk to the librarian, Corporal Harbin, and suggest that he could acquire more books about alchemy. Are you planning on becoming a state alchemist?"

"Er, no, no, sir. I couldn't, it takes too much work since I'd have to research something and I don't know what and I wouldn't have time for it since I have my job here..."

"Hm. Well, if you can think of a research topic that would be very beneficial to the Fort, you could probably scale down your other duties to free up time for that."

Shrike was amazed again. "Thank you, sir."

"If Envy ever tries to coax you into trying to bring back dead people or learning how to create Philosopher's Stones, tell me immediately."

"The Philosopher's Stone? That's just an alchemical fairy tale, sir."

"I take it Envy hasn't mentioned it to you, then. Philosopher's Stones are real, and they are made of living people, which is why people have tried to obscure away all details about how to create them."

"...What?"

"I'm not an alchemist, but what I've understood, the maker of a Philosopher's Stone forces many humans into a transmutation circle, then forces their souls out of their bodies and makes the Stone with those souls. Then the people's bodies die since they don't have souls."

Shrike just stared at Armstrong.

"Also, homunculi have a Philosopher's Stone as their core. Envy is a homunculus and thus it has numerous souls of humans inside it, fuelling its existence. Envy dies if the Stone inside it is destroyed."

Colour escaped from Shrike's face. What Armstrong was saying sounded completely unbelievable and Shrike was not sure he could believe her, but there was something else he remembered about the issue. He had to think quietly for a short moment before he spoke again. "Th-that's what it meant..." he mumbled.

Suddenly Armstrong did not like at all where the conversation was going. "Shrike?"

"U-uh, shortly after we met, I asked Envy what its true form looked like."

Armstrong remembered the image of the eldritch abomination that was Envy's true form and her face spontaneously twitched.

Shrike actually noticed that Armstrong's expression changed for the blink of an eye, which made him a little more anxious. "I-it said that... 'red and oval, the size of my fist.' It must have meant th-the Philosopher's Stone, maybe... I think it's usually described as red..."

Now Armstrong cleared her throat rather ungraciously and became her usual self. "Really?" she asked, obviously not expecting a reply. Shrike had no idea what had just happened. "Anyway, I don't know alchemy or anything more about the making of a Philosopher's Stone. You're not allowed to make any. Anything else?"

"Um, uh, no, sir... But, wait, Envy mentioned something about creating souls with alchemy and bringing back dead people a couple of weeks ago. But... it said doing that is impossible. And I know it's forbidden too."

"Hm." Armstrong looked a little confused. "Good then. Was that all? If so, you can go."

His mood elevated, Shrike saluted the Major General and walked to the door.

"And Shrike, I hope you learned something about talking to someone about things you wish to change in your life," she said in her usual stern but otherwise emotionless tone.

"Oh... oh!" said Shrike in a somewhat small voice as he realised that he could have changed his schedule and priorities years ago if he had only talked to someone about it. "Yes, sir..." Shrike left Armstrong's office and went to talk to Massena right away.

* * *

The next night, when Envy and Shrike had a shift of ventilation shaft inspection, Shrike was more interested in telling about his new schedules.

"I am so glad. Massena said she'd schedule less combat training for me so I could study alchemy! I still have one combat session a week and one session got replaced with physical training." He knocked and patted a pipe that seemed rather worn, but concluded that it was sound. "And all because I talked to Linke about it and he said I should suggest it to... well, someone. I didn't really think of suggesting it to my superiors before, I guess I was afraid they'd just reject it. That way I at least had hope."

Envy merely made a bored expression.

"Armstrong even said that if I can come up with a research topic that would benefit Fort Briggs especially, I could become a state alchemist. I'm nowhere near that good and I have no idea what I could research, but maybe some day I will."

"You're unusually talkative."

"I guess. I'm just really excited about this, it will probably wear off in a few days."

"Mmhm. That looks like a tear." Envy pointed at a pipe ahead. They walked to the spot and eyed the insulation.

"It isn't quite a tear yet."

"But if we don't fix it, it will just wear out more and then we'll need to fix it next year or something."

"Yeah... I guess it's better to just fix it now." Shrike took out the transmutation circle he used to fuse patches on pipes and then started searching for a patch in his bag.

"What do you exactly do when you fuse that thing on the pipe?"

"Oh, I just meld and blend both materials at the edges. They become a little like liquid, except not quite because they both should retain their structure. It's actually better than welding since welding heats the materials so much that they break down a little, though the fused part will be stronger. However, then the weak spot will be the material right next to the welded part. When I alchemically fuse them, it will be more uniform."

"Mmhm."

Shrike found a suitable patch and placed it on the pipe. Envy watched him fuse the patch and had an urge to tell him about its own alchemy skills. Shrike would probably be able to help it with its problems and explain things to it in a way that was not as horribly boring as reading a book. It sighed.

"Hm?" said Shrike.

"Eh, I just wish I could do that too," it said absent-mindedly.

"Umm. Well, are you completely sure about that you're unable to perform alchemy? Maybe you could try and see."

"I'm sure."

"Oh. Well, I... I can't help with that."

Envy glared at Shrike and wished that the man would be able to keep a secret, but that was hopeless. He would tell everything to Armstrong, if not right now without her having to even ask, then later when she asked the right way. Envy was fairly sure that even threatening him with death would not make him keep its secret. Even if he would not talk, Armstrong would notice that that he would not answer some questions and figure out that something was amiss eventually.

Shrike looked a little intimidated and headed out of the maintenance shaft. Envy followed him, cranky.

* * *

Envy kept on doing its small-scale alchemy experiments in the Fort and continued being cautious so as to not be found out. It read a couple more of Shrike's alchemy books while on its vacations. Shrike noticed that and asked it why it rather read the alchemy books and not the novels. He accepted its explanation of them being more interesting. However, Armstrong was not so understanding when Shrike mentioned Envy's reading habits to her.

Armstrong went to the library when it was time for Envy's reading session. It had at least five books open on the table at which it sat. Armstrong saw that the book it was reading at the moment was a biology book, but it had a newly acquired alchemy book open on the table as well.

Envy looked up at Armstrong just before she spoke.

"Why are you reading alchemy books?"

Envy stared at her in an irritated manner. "They're more interesting than a lot of other books."

"The knowledge in them is useless to you since you can't perform alchemy."

"Well, most of it sure, but there are also bits of information that explain some things about my abilities and those are the ones I'm more interested in. And the rest isn't completely boring either, unlike everything in that," it said and pointed at a book on the table that was about the history of Creta.

"Somehow I find that suspicious. Stop reading alchemy books. You can read novels instead."

"What, novels?" said Envy with a mildly disgusted impression. "I read a few that Shrike brought with him on the vacation. They're stupid and full of annoying human drama. Much like history books. The only good thing is that they can sometimes be kind of funny if a lot of people die in them." That earned a rather murderous look from Armstrong. Envy felt like it should take back what it had said and tried to sound sincere, even if a little reluctant, while speaking. "Sorry, okay, it's not funny if a lot of people die, fine? But alchemy books are still more interesting since I can find at least a few things in them that can be useful."

"That's too bad. Stop reading them. Get your ideas from that or somewhere else than alchemy." She pointed at the biology book Envy was holding.

"That is totally unfair!" it exclaimed and glared at her.

"You don't want Grumman and Mustang to get too suspicious, do you?"

Envy grimaced. "Are you reporting EVERYTHING I do to them?" She just stared at it quietly. "Can't you just not mention this one bit if you're so worried about them being suspicious?"

"Do you think it's so suspicious that I shouldn't tell about it to them?"

Envy faced a dead end. Now that Armstrong had brought it up, it was pretty obvious that at least Mustang would be way too untrusting to allow Envy to read about alchemy, and that was if he did not fly off his rocker right away. Envy picked up the alchemy book and waved it around. "Fine, FINE. I'll stop reading them to retain that blasted stupid prick's sanity. Which he doesn't have, by the way! I'm just going to be bored to death on my vacation now; no reading about anything even a little interesting, no going out on my own and what else! So thanks, thanks a lot, and screw you, SIR."

"Mind your tone," came Armstrong's extremely cold response.

Envy sighed so deeply that its breath turned the pages of the biology book that now lay in front of it. "I am SO bloody SORRY, sir," it said in an appropriately pleading tone while not looking one bit like it was apologising. Armstrong just glared at it even worse.

Envy fantasised about throwing the book at her. With its strength, it could well manage to kill her if it had a little luck and hit a proper spot on her head or neck. However, she was very fast for a human and would dodge it, unless Envy faked its throw first and only threw the book after she had dodged. It did not fulfil its fantasy and instead leaned its elbows on the table, put its hand on its face and spent a short moment reminding itself what would happen if it would not play nice.

Envy straightened itself, removed its hand from its face and looked at Armstrong again. It stared at her seriously and spoke reluctantly. "Sorry." It held out the alchemy book, expecting her to not take the book away but to be rude at it.

Armstrong looked down her nose at the book. "Take that to its place." Having said that, she turned around and left.

Its expectations filled, Envy slammed the book annoyedly to a corner of the table and looked after Armstrong with a very sour expression on its face. At least it believed it had managed to make her act rudely, even if it was obvious that taking books away was not her job at all.

* * *

Armstrong was quite sure that she had managed to intimidate Envy to stop reading about alchemy. Nonetheless, even though she was still certain that it was unable to perform alchemy, she could not help being suspicious of it because other people could perform alchemy for it if it forced them in one way or another. Therefore, she had the Fort, Envy's room and Shrike's room searched thoroughly to make sure it really was not trying to construct suspicious transmutation circles anywhere. The searchers found Envy's "journal" that seemed to contain mostly complaining about humans, childish notes about the anatomy of animals, instructions for ventilation machine maintenance and statistics about foodstuffs. Armstrong thought the book was fishy and took it for analysis.

Envy noticed rather soon that the book was gone. It thought that if it did not bring up the theft, Armstrong might think that it was being secretive and trying to cover up for something, so it loudly declared its displeasure about the book being missing. Linke knew nothing of it, so Envy went straight to Armstrong. She directly admitted that she had taken the book to be studied just because it was suspicious. Envy did not have much to say to that, but of course it still expressed its annoyance. It acquired a new empty book from the supplies office.

Armstrong had difficulty in finding experts who would know what to look for in Envy's book. She could not trust the impartiality of the few alchemists who were familiar with the Philosopher's Stone because they were Edward Elric, Mustang and their friends who she figured had every reason to get rid of Envy in any way possible. In the end, she settled for a few less qualified alchemists and Alphonse Elric, who she trusted to be level-headed enough.

According to the analyses, the book seemed to have light references to alchemy, and Alphonse found some links to human ingredients. He did not find any suggestion of transmutation circles, but he suggested giving the book to a ventilation expert to check that the writings on that subject were not suspicious. Armstrong did as he advised.

The ventilation expert found more faults in the writings and complained that there were elementary mistakes typical of a beginner. He requested that the writer should be educated more and even offered corrections to the writings. However, he too came to the conclusion that there was nothing particularly suspicious besides the fact that the writer had learned while doing rather than by starting from theory.

When Armstrong was done with analysing Envy's writings, she summoned it to her to give the book back.

Envy took the book with a crabby face. "Are we done here?" it asked.

"Now that you ask, not quite. Your writings have some connections to alchemy and rather detailed information about the composition of the human body. Why?"

"When all you have is a hammer, you're going to see a lot of nails, you know. Amazingly enough, that goes not only for you trying to see in whatever's mine an intent to design some transmutation circle for creating a Philosopher's Stone or something, right, but also for me in writing in a so-called suspicious way because my abilities work in a way similar to alchemy! Didn't I already mention this to you? And yes, I write about human physiology because that's what I need to know and change when I shapeshift. Did you even notice the animal parts in the writings? In case you didn't know, I have been reading about animals to make myself better than just an awesome superhuman. It's working pretty well."

Armstrong stared at Envy with a displeased expression. For the first time, Envy felt uncomfortable enough to realise its uneasiness without getting any straightforward threats or particularly murderous looks. It would never admit being anxious because of some human things, so it chose to ridicule Armstrong instead. "Are we done with this farce? Stop seeing bad suspicious alchemy everywhere already. If you're so worried, start studying alchemy yourself so you can see that it was all for nothing."

"Do not talk to me like that."

"Well sorry, SIR!" said Envy with its face twisted. "Even you must realise that I'm annoyed since you took my stuff and then accuse me of being suspicious or whatever."

Armstrong continued her staring. "Don't push your luck. Your vacations are suspended for two months."

Envy became aggravated. "But– –!"

"Do you want a longer suspension?" Envy stared intensely at Armstrong, a troublesomely fractious expression on its face. "You can go. And don't make me regret letting you get away with this."

Envy frowned even more and left, barely managing to not stomp massive dents onto the floor. It was incredibly displeased. Armstrong was definitely unhappy about Envy's intentions.

Since Envy did not want to screw up its chance to continue being moderately safe in Fort Briggs, it started being even warier about Armstrong and did its best to not draw her attention. Though it kept practising alchemy, it mostly did thought practises and read more about natural sciences. It thought it probably needed to understand science more fundamentally in order to perform alchemy better. While it still did some alchemical experiments, it was very careful with them. For now, studying things related to alchemy was interesting enough even without unnecessary risks. It was also more heedful of the topics it wrote about in its journal.

Weeks passed. While Envy still played nicely, it was irritable and often complained that it was surly because it did not get to go on its vacation at all. Shrike bore its complaints for six weeks, but then even he started getting too tired of them. He still did nothing about the issue because the suspension of Envy's vacations would end in two weeks, and so he tried to just avoid it. Envy noticed his avoidance and questioned him about that. Surprisingly enough for Shrike, Envy seemed a little confused when he explained his unwillingness to continuously listen to it complain. It then said it would try to cut its grumbling, and did so.

During the two months, Armstrong observed Envy and asked about its doings from the people with whom it spent the most time. She received congruent responses that Envy was annoyed and kept complaining but was otherwise mostly the same as before and did not do anything noticeably peculiar. She also could not find evidence of transmutation circles in the Fort. Since Envy's behaviour became less suspicious, when the two months were up, she lifted the suspension and allowed it to go on vacation again.


	3. Future

It was the beginning of November and the first trip after the two-month suspension of Envy's vacation, and Linke frowned. He had just realized that he was hearing a tiny buzzing sound from the back of the off-road automobile where Envy was sitting. He turned his head at Envy. "What is that sound?"

Envy lifted its eyes from its hand and gave him a small glare without moving its head. "I'm changing the structure of my skin." In reality, it was designing transmutation circles by changing its complexion.

"Okay..." It took him a small moment to realise that he still did not know what the sound was. "But how about the sound?"

"Alchemical reactions usually make that sound. And so it happens also when I shapeshift." Envy shapeshifted its arm to have multiple joints so that it could pat Linke on the head from the front of the car. The shapeshifting produced the exact same sound as just a moment before, though slightly louder, and small bolts of red lightning flashed around Envy's arm.

Linke was a little surprised but remembered now that he had always heard the sound and seen the lightning when Envy shapeshifted. "Ah."

Envy shapeshifted its arm back to normal and continued fiddling with its hand, making the same little buzzing sound as it kept changing.

"Oh, I see. Sorry I bothered you."

Envy kept its face neutral and said nothing derisive since he had apologised. It went back to thinking about the little circles and then wondered how small it could make them.

Linke, then again, decided to talk to Shrike. Shrike was driving the car down the mountain road.

"Did you meet your father yet?"

"Yeah, just a week ago actually."

"How did it go?"

"Pretty well, I guess."

"Did you find out if he has a hobby or something like that?"

"Yeah... He told me he likes to go to restaurants and eat different foods. And that he sometimes goes to the theatre. He took me to eat at a nice diner that had this most awesome char, bread and corn I ever had."

Linke almost smiled. "That's splendid."

"And I guess understand better now that parents have a tendency to ask their children about them getting a family. He asked me, but he was really non-assertive about it. Said I should only think about having a family when I'm ready. He said that he probably wasn't when he had me."

"Oh. Well, perhaps that was a correct assessment if he failed to be there with you when you were growing up."

"I sort of turned the question around at him and suggested he could get another child too."

"Hah! That's... That would be really insensitive if I said that to MY parents, since my mother is too old to have any more children. I guess it is much less insensitive in your case."

"Hm, he seemed a little shaken by that though."

"He did? I suppose he had a hard time getting over your mother and has difficulty finding another woman."

"Maybe... Anyway, he didn't really grill me about getting a family."

"I'm jealous." For understandable reasons, that got Envy's attention and it started following the two men's conversation now. "My father just telephoned me a few days ago and gave me a long talk on how I should act around women. Apparently this sermon was triggered by Charlene – that's the woman from North City I was seeing – saying she didn't want to have to always wait for me to come back, and so she had told my family that she was leaving me." Envy sniggered. "I do not think that's very funny."

"Think what you want," said Envy and grinned at him widely.

Linke tried to ignore Envy and continued. "Then he said something about wanting grandchildren and spoiling them rotten, and I told him I was on duty and had to go, even though I wasn't."

"Well, now you can go for Northrop. She hasn't started with anyone new as far as I know," said Envy. "Hmh... Linke, do you even want kids? If you don't, you should say that bluntly to your daddy's face. That ought to make him stop bothering you."

For a moment, Linke was speechless. "Huh. No one ever even asked me whether I WOULD want any children. My parents and sisters just assumed that I should and would without a second thought. But I guess that wouldn't matter so much since I'd still be working in Briggs and my hypothetical wife would be at home taking care of the children."

Shrike gave Linke a glare. "If you do get married and have children, please don't do that, sir," he said.

"What? You do know I'd have to earn a living for them, correct?"

"You should request a transfer to North City then. Just... don't have your children grow up virtually fatherless if you can avoid it. Seriously, sir."

Linke frowned at Shrike and continued after a short pause. "Oh... I see your point. Still, I'd get week of vacation every six weeks like everyone else so I could go home to them pretty often."

"It's still a long time, especially for a child."

"Hm. Maybe. Well, I'll see if it ever happens." Linke shrugged. "I guess I do want to have children at some point. I don't want to disappoint my parents."

Envy rolled its eyes at Linke and his playing by his parents' will. "How about you, Shrike? Do you want to get a family at some point?" came its comment from the back.

Shrike's hands tightened around the steering wheel and he went a little pale. "W-what? With you?"

Linke looked surprised and somewhat disturbed.

"Ha ha ha! Ahaha! No, stupid! I meant in general."

"O-oh... um, well, no. I mean... not now at least! I'm just not ready for that kind of stuff, at all. I'd have no idea..."

"But eventually you would like a family?"

"I... I really can't say right now."

"I can already see it... Little annoying miniature Shrikes running around and climbing into the ventilation pipes and getting stuck there, heh heh!"

Linke laughed a little and Shrike felt very embarrassed. "How about you then, Envy? Do you want to get a family?" Shrike asked, trying to turn the question around.

"WHAT?" said Envy amazingly incredulously and proceeded to laugh. It did not stop any time soon, and in fact laughed so long that Shrike and Linke had time to start wondering why it was laughing so much.

"Is that normal?" asked Linke. Shrike looked quite stunned and could not reply anything. "Do you have any idea why he found that so funny?"

"No... really, no," mumbled Shrike.

After laughing at the absurdity of Shrike's idea for another moment, Envy suddenly amused itself with the ridiculous idea and imagined having children. How would it even be possible? It was impossible! Envy chuckled a bit more before the thought dawned on it that while homunculi could not breed like humans, they could be created with alchemy.

Envy could perform alchemy.

Therefore, Envy could create new homunculi.

It suddenly sat back up and stared at the back of the front seats of the car extremely intently.

Shrike and Linke noticed that it stopped laughing, and Linke turned to look at it.

"Envy?" he asked. "What was so funny? Envy?"

Envy was not willing to acknowledge the existence of any kind of interference at the moment.

"Envy?"

"Linke... stop," whispered Shrike. "Be quiet."

"What is he doing?"

Shrike glanced at Linke and whispered "shh" again. Linke looked irritated but sat quietly.

Envy kept on thinking about its new idea. It had some knowledge about the way it had been created and could recite the instructions, but it did not truly understand them itself. It surmised that true understanding of the procedure would require extensive knowledge of alchemy and particularly human transmutation. It had nowhere near enough information of the issue past knowing the composition and physiology of a human body. The fact that no human in Amestris had ever successfully created a homunculus did not make Envy concerned. Father had been able to create homunculi and the humans could not manage it because it was both forbidden and Father had not let information of that particular area of alchemy get out at all.

Envy spent the whole trip thinking about the issue with nearly inhuman concentration, though it had to reprimand Shrike when he drove too carelessly and made the car bump too forcefully. It did not care at all when the men started talking again.

Linke spoke after an hour of concentrated silence. "Envy?" He got no reply. "Shrike, what is going on with him?"

"I don't know... Envy gets like that sometimes when it comes up with something or is angry. Then it's really better to just let it be."

"I should hope he isn't angry."

"Probably not."

When they arrived in the forest where Envy usually had its vacations, they got out of the car and Envy seemed quite normal again.

"Um, Envy? What was with all that laughing and silence?" asked Shrike.

Envy looked at him a little irritatedly. "The idea of me breeding is just ludicrous. Not not mention yucky. It's downright revolting! Then I happened to think of something else and had a really great idea but it turned out that it's impossible." It shrugged. "Then I was quiet for two hours because I felt like it." It grinned and walked off to eat some plants.

Shrike and Linke accepted the explanation without hesitation.

Envy, then again, continued thinking about its idea. Creating a homunculus was not impossible. It was doable. Envy still did not quite know how it would go about the creation, but at least it started to figure out what kind of knowledge it would need to find out.

* * *

Envy spent about a week gathering what it knew and remembered of creating a homunculus and figuring out what kind of information it still lacked. It knew the basics of alchemy and the final steps to making a proper homunculus, but everything else in between was missing. As it collected its data, it naturally did not write anything down but kept all its findings in its head, which was annoying at times since it had to always recall its previous thoughts about the issue. It also thought about how it would get the information it needed and became very annoyed. Was there any way it could get all what it required?

For the moment, Envy's only chance to learn more alchemy was to secretly read the alchemy books. Shrike had a few books of his own and occasionally went to North City to borrow or buy more. The library still had the few basic books, but the librarian Corporal Harbin had acquired a couple more at Shrike's request. Being so secretive about reading them was irksome, and it could not get its hands on every book Shrike brought in because even though he held onto the books for a long time, he mostly kept them in his room or his study room and Envy did not have any business visiting them.

Since Envy could not learn the theory of alchemy fast enough for its own liking, it also thought about the practical things. It was obvious that it would tell no one of its attempt to create a new homunculus. Therefore, it would have to hide everything it did, which meant that it needed a place where it could perform the transmutation unobserved. While there were some remote and rarely visited corners in the Fort, no place inside would be a private enough space. The only conceivable place was outside, in the forest where the trees would cover all possible traces, or in a cave. There was plenty of forest in Envy's vacation spot, but it also required privacy from its escorts and achieving that was much trickier. The only way would be to convince Shrike and Linke to not tell Armstrong of its going off on its own or Armstrong giving it permission to run around alone. Envy figured that the latter option was more probable since Armstrong had previously said she would be willing to let it out on its own. It only needed to wait.

Another practical issue concerning the creation of a homunculus was the making of the body. That task Envy considered to be the simplest part because it thought it understood human physiology perfectly, or at the least almost perfectly, and better than any human in any case. Envy could create the needed mass using its own Philosopher's Stone, but doing so would be needlessly fancy when it could just as well get the substances on a market. Of course, Envy buying the substances for a human body on a market would be the epitome of suspiciousness, so the more convenient option was to capture animals and transmute their bodies into their basic elements and then transmute the body using those substances. It did not consider breaking a body down to its basic elements difficult since it occasionally did similar things when it shapeshifted.

The new homunculus would naturally need a Philosopher's Stone. Since Envy had no way of suddenly making it without anyone knowing, it decided to just split its own Stone in half. It was not sure how big a Philosopher's Stone it really needed, but it was sure that half and even less was enough to sustain its current body.

One thing that Envy was very unsure of was whether creating a homunculus would count as true human transmutation. A homunculus was an artificial human and not a real one, but it had to admit there were similarities. It knew Father had not been taken in front of the Gate just to create it and its siblings, but was that just because he had perfect control over alchemy and a massive Philosopher's Stone or because creating homunculi was not really human transmutation?

If creating homunculi was human transmutation and Envy needed to pay something for performing that, would it have enough Philosopher's Stone to both create the homunculus and pay however much the toll would be? Envy did not know and had no way to find out. Its uncertainty discouraged it.

Envy lost the initial enthusiasm for its grand idea once it realised that it might not have enough energy in its Philosopher's Stone. After that, it proceeded in its alchemy studies in a much calmer manner. That helped it come up with ways to get the information it needed.

Days and weeks went by as Envy tried to learn what it could about human transmutation. While it did not tell Shrike about its endeavours, it designed some complex questions and innocent-seeming remarks that did not reveal the actual subject or reason behind them but that still helped it advance its own research when Shrike explained the issues to it or did research in its stead.

Finally, after the year had changed to 1916 and January had went by, Armstrong gave Envy permission to go walk by itself during its vacations, though other soldiers still accompanied it to the forest. Envy immediately used that to its advantage. Even though its private time in the forest during the vacation was rather restricted as well, it made good use of that time. It searched the thick woods for a suitable place and eventually found what it was looking for: a long since abandoned farm. The farm had previously been a part of a tiny village only a couple of kilometres away, but as far as Envy knew, the village was dwindling as well, its inhabitants moving off in search of better land and living conditions, if it was not already completely abandoned.

The farm looked like it had before, though the fields around the farm were not really fields any longer but thickets with a variety of young trees, bushes and undergrowth – and currently, a thick layer of snow. The two remaining buildings that were still relatively intact were shaded by taller trees and covered by climbing plants. One of the buildings was the main building and the other a barn built mostly with stone.

Envy inspected every spot of the area by eye since it did not want to leave too obvious tracks of its presence. After it had made sure the area was empty, it changed into a snake-like shape and slithered under the snow to get into the buildings. It found no traces of humans, but it did find a family of three lynxes in the attic of the main building. The animals were terrified of it and would not stop growling, so it ate them. It wondered how its improved digestive system would handle the hard parts of their bodies: the bones, teeth and claws.

Once it had made sure that the place was secure, Envy promptly got to work and did some larger-scale alchemy tests. It cleaned up the interior of the barn and changed the building's layout back and forth.

Envy noticed that while it had been able to clean the barn's interior by moving and reshaping the stone material, it had some difficulty transmuting the plant material. It thought that maybe transmuting organic material had a some kind of special trick to it that it did not yet know fully even though it was able to shapeshift and thus effectively apply alchemy to itself, and it was sure it was living and organic. It then studied the plants and got better at changing their structure.

* * *

Envy continued with its studies and experimented more boldly in the abandoned farm, but eventually it ran into a wall. Envy was very frustrated that the larger-scale experiments did not really help it understand anything new. There was no way it could learn to understand the missing links to creating a new homunculus, no matter what it did. It needed information from several different areas of alchemy and really needed to ask Shrike about some things that it just could not understand for whatever reason, a fact that it resented incredibly, even if it knew that there were things about alchemy it and no one else in the world knew.

Envy went over its options again. It had to tell Shrike about its alchemy skills to get any useful help, but it had to also make sure that he would not tell Armstrong anything. It pondered what was the best way to achieve that. It could either threaten his life, claim that Armstrong would kill it if he told her or just ask him seriously to keep his mouth shut. It came to the conclusion that all options were effective and risky in their own ways. Shrike would be certainly quiet if Envy threatened him, but he would be stressed and very nervous when dealing with Armstrong, which would make it more likely that Armstrong would draw her own conclusions and start bothering Envy or just force Shrike to speak. If Envy claimed that Armstrong would kill it if she learned of its abilities, it guessed that Shrike would be incredibly torn between his silly love for it and his loyalty to Fort Briggs, since he would understand that the issue was very important, so much so that even he would figure out that Envy was up to something. If Envy merely asked him to keep it secret, he would not be stressed and probably would not think that Envy's alchemy skills were that important an issue, but then he would be more likely to tell it to Armstrong casually if she asked about it.

In the end, Envy decided to just ask Shrike to keep quiet and perhaps imply that Armstrong would get her panties in an imposing tangle if she found out about its alchemy skills before it had managed to make it clear that it was not going to kill everyone with them.

It was the beginning of March, and Envy once again watched boredly how Shrike prepared to fuse a patch on a broken pipe.

"Wait," it said.

"Hmm? What?" asked Shrike.

Envy grinned rather widely and shapeshifted its hand so that its palm depicted the same kind of transmutation circle that Shrike always used to fuse the patches on the pipes. "Look at this." It then pressed its hand on the pipe and melded the patch to the pipe exactly in the same manner as Shrike.

Shrike started at the pipe and seemed rather confused. "But... didn't you tell me that you were sure you couldn't do alchemy?"

"Well, it turned out that I was wrong. I have no idea how this is possible, but here we are."

"Huh."

"Anyway, listen. I really, really want you to not tell about this to Armstrong. I'm worried she might lose it and tell me to not study alchemy at all or do something even worse. So can you PLEASE try to keep this a secret?" it asked, managing to sound both pleading and frustrated as it spoke.

"Ummh..." Shrike seemed shifty. "But... It's... I think she would be just interested. I mean, she was when I told her that I could perform alchemy, at least sort of. And if you want to study more, she would probably allow you to spend more time on it too."

Envy stared at Shrike and saw that he obviously did not understand the threat of it knowing alchemy. "It's not about that kind of stuff. She'd get her panties in a knot because she would think that I was going to do something really dangerous with alchemy. You know alchemy can be really dangerous, right?"

"Well... yes, but couldn't you do that even without alchemy? You can shapeshift into a horrible beast and do pretty much anything. And seriously, even a regular person could kill large amounts of people just like that. All they need is a machine gun or a large car in a crowd."

"Oh. Yeah, sure," said Envy agreeably, not challenging what Shrike had said. "I suppose, but she'd still act irrationally about it because of what I am and what I've done before. I just want to study alchemy and I'm sure she'll at the least prohibit me from studying it at all if she learns that I can perform alchemy."

"Um... But... I can't keep this a secret if she asks me."

"Of course you can! Seriously, Shrike, the only thing you need to say is 'What? No.' That's all! The shorter you keep it and the more clueless you look, the better. You're fairly decent at looking clueless."

"Oh..."

"And if she doesn't ask, just don't bring it up. It isn't so hard."

"Uh. Well, maybe I can try it... But... what if she finds it out anyway and finds out also that I've been keeping this a secret from her? I don't want to – –"

"Come on, she wouldn't do anything to you. You're loyal and harmless. It's not that big a thing. Well, maybe you'd get some extra laundry duty or whatever but don't tell me you'd reveal everything to her just to possibly be spared from a few laundry shifts."

"Eh... Yeah, I guess you're right."

"So you'll do your best to keep this a secret?"

"Yeah."

Envy made a considerably less creepy grin. "Okay, great. Anyway, I pretty much wanted to tell you this because I've been studying alchemy for a while on my own but I'm stuck now because there are just some things I don't get. So, can you help me?"

"Ah, sure. Um, was that why you wanted to read my alchemy books during the vacations?"

"No. First it was exactly what I told you back then, it wasn't so boring to read and I got some shapeshifting ideas from them. I figured out this performing alchemy thing later," it said with a shrug.

"Oh. Well, I can teach you some things but I don't really know all that much either..."

"But you can get some books from North City, unlike I."

"Yeah. Um, where could we study? I mean, if we're supposed to keep this secret, we'd need to hide or something."

"Don't you have that study room where you do alchemy experiments?"

"Well, yeah, but it might be suspicious if you started coming in there too."

Envy was irritated. "Darn it. Well, at least you can smuggle me the books so I can read them on my own and we can talk about stuff while we do this stuff."

"Hmm, yeah."

* * *

Yet more days, weeks and months went by as Envy tried to learn what it could of human transmutation without making anyone suspicious of what it was doing. At the same time, it ate a lot and tried to add as much energy to its Philosopher's Stone as it could. It spent so much time thinking about creating a new homunculus that it did not even sleep any longer except an hour or few during its short vacations.

This time of studying was one rare period in Envy's life because it could not just blindly jump in and do what it wanted. It knew that if it did not have enough energy in its Philosopher's Stone, it would probably just die. Or worse, its transmutation would fail altogether and it would be reduced back to its pitiful true form.

Shrike brought some more alchemy books from North City and studied them with Envy. Most often it was he who read them thoroughly and then he explained the subjects to Envy, which improved his knowledge quite dramatically.

Envy wondered why the example transmutation circles were so different to what it remembered from the material the homunculi had most often seen, but it figured out rather soon that it was because the homunculi had mostly concerned themselves with human transmutation issues or the creating of Philosopher's Stones, and the readily available library books naturally did not touch the subjects. After a few arguments with Shrike about the shape and content of the circles, Envy kept its knowledge of human transmutation circles to itself.

Shrike did not know why Envy became so concentrated on alchemy, but since that was obviously beneficial to him as well, he did not complain. He studied alchemy alongside Envy and put more effort in it since he wanted to and had to stay ahead of Envy, mostly because its patience wore very thin very quickly if he did not explain alchemy to it in a concise way.

Shrike gradually grew to accepting the idea that maybe it would be possible for him to become a state alchemist after all. He started getting more interested in thermodynamics and wondered how alchemy would be able to affect it. Once Shrike had reread the theories of thermodynamics and finally understood the basics of the subject, he saw how alchemy could be easily used to manipulate the thermal energies involved. Heat was the presence of movement and vibration in matter, and alchemy manipulated energy in a way that would be possible to apply to thermal theories. Shrike figured out that to apply alchemy to thermodynamics, matter would not even have to be deconstructed and re-constructed.

Figuring out what kind of transmutation circle the manipulation of thermal energy would require turned out to be a lot trickier to find out and Shrike grew very frustrated with it. He battled with his ideas for a week. Eventually he just snapped at Envy and heatedly explained the whole of his problem to it. Doing that took him nearly an hour.

They were studying in Shrike's study room, where Envy occasionally went even though that could be seen as suspicious. It only made sure that it had a good reason to be there and did not do it too often. While Shrike explained his issues, Envy just stared at him and listened quietly to his ranting. It did not interrupt him or even try to ignore him by continuing with the book it had been reading before the ranting had started.

Once Shrike had calmed down and realised what he had done, we could not believe that Envy had said absolutely nothing, had listened to him and apparently had also understood what his problem was.

"I don't know why you think there's something so difficult with your issue," said Envy once Shrike had calmed down enough to understand what it was saying. "Even though you just spent an hour explaining your troubles! I kept waiting for you to explain why you couldn't figure it out and you didn't even tell," it continued indignantly. "The solution, in case you're wondering, is obvious. The transmutation circle focuses alchemy properly. The runes and other shapes direct the deconstruction and reconstruction of matter. The circular shapes control the flow of energy. Just draw a transmutation circle that only has circles! Use an eccentric ellipse if you want to be really bold. It can't be that hard. If that doesn't work, draw a simple line through it, that ought to direct the energy wherever you think you want it."

"...Wha-what..." Shrike stared at Envy and could not believe what he had just heard. Now that he heard it and had a few quick thoughts about it, it made perfect sense to him as well. But why had he not thought about it himself, if it was that simple? And if it was not that simple, how did Envy know of it at all?

Envy just frowned at Shrike and wondered if he was getting it.

"How can you know something like that?" he asked finally.

"How can you not know it? That was obvious to me even before I started studying alchemy!"

Shrike stared at Envy for yet a moment, but then he started for his working desk and spent a moment drawing some circles. Envy went back to its book and did not really pay attention to him until it heard the sound of something catching on fire and Shrike shouting something about success.

"I did it! I transferred energy from this piece of paper into that, and now this is extremely cold and the other just combusted!" Shrike tried to grab the cold piece of paper into his hand but it disintegrated because of its frailty. "Oops..."

"Uh-huh, cool," mumbled Envy and continued reading its book.

Shrike made some notes and wanted to tell about his achievement to Armstrong and offer to make something of his discovery so that it could benefit the whole Fort. However, he started dwelling deeper into the implications of beginning to use alchemy in the Fort and spent a few more days organising his thoughts before he was ready to talk to Armstrong.

Shrike sought out the Major General and met her and her secretary Major Rodney in one of Fort Briggs's corridors.

"Sir, do you have a minute?"

"Depends on what your issue is."

"It's about an alchemical idea I came up with... and about using alchemy here in the Fort."

"Hm. Go ahead."

"I discovered that it's possible and rather easy to transfer thermal energy in order to chill or warm objects. I suspect that isn't a very new discovery, but it isn't mentioned in any of my books in the exact manner as I do it. Using the technique I came up with, I don't need to transform the material at all, only manipulate the energy. There is a possibility I could use that to warm or thaw or chill places that are difficult to get into here."

"Congratulations on explaining your issue understandably. However, we can already warm up or chill the Fort adequately. Why would we need alchemy for that?"

"That is related to the other issue I was thinking about, sir. If I come up with an idea of utilising alchemy that would be very beneficial for the Fort, would we then become dependent on alchemy? I think it's important that whatever we do here should also be achievable without alchemy. Because if something depends only on it... then it would depend only on me. I really shouldn't become that irreplaceable. Placing so much responsibility on one person feels... well... irresponsible, sir."

Armstrong stared at Shrike for a moment. "You're right. Nonetheless, do consider this point of view: If we find a flaw of some sort in the Fort, a hole in security, and the only way to fix it is with alchemy, then we should use alchemy before we are compromised. Correct?"

"Y-yes, sir... of course we should. But I just don't think alchemy should be the first solution even if it seemed obvious."

"Hmph. Perhaps the trouble is figuring out when is the last chance to not use alchemy and when it must be used."

"Yes, sir."

"Your idea of the transfer of thermal energy sounds useful. If you need to train for that, go out and practise until you're sure enough that nothing can go wrong if you do it at a critical time in the Fort."

"Yes, sir."

"While we're on this topic, have you heard of alkahestry?"

"It's... some form of alchemy from Xing, I think, sir."

"What do you think of it?"

"I don't really know much about it."

"Find out anything you can about it and tell me if any of it would be useful to the Fort."

"Acknowledged." Shrike stood quietly for a short moment. "Uh, is there anything else, sir?"

"No, you can go."

Shrike turned and left, wondering how he could get his hands on information concerning alkahestry. He had only seen it mentioned briefly in some very new book about the history of alchemy. He also was not personally interested in it.


	4. Reasons

Time went by. Shrike's 28th birthday in spring went by largely unnoticed, though he received from his father a card that was only three weeks late. Now that he and his father had become closer, he occasionally talked to his colleagues about what he and his father had done and what they had written to each other, which was a considerable increase in his topics about his family since he had previously not talked about the issue at all. He mostly spoke to Linke but some of the time both Linke and Envy were present to hear his stories. Envy just ignored him and thought about something else.

The first time Shrike talked about his father to just Envy, it just bore the conversation and responded with obnoxious disinterest. It was extremely annoyed but decided to not verbally attack him yet.

The second time Shrike brought up the topic of his father, Envy was a lot less patient.

"I was in North City last week," said Shrike after he and Envy had finished a shift of ventilation shaft inspection and were on their way to the mess.

"I know," mumbled Envy.

"Oh? I probably mentioned it before I left. Anyway, I met my dad again. He'd gotten a bullet graze on his left arm but it was okay by then. He took me to a different restaurant each day and – –"

Envy turned to face Shrike and yelled at him. "Shrike, shut up! Why are you telling me this? Why are you even doing that crap? Your daddy left you alone when you were a kid – heck, even younger than that! And now you're acting like he's the best parent ever or something! What the hell is up with that? You should hate him!"

Shrike was completely taken by surprise and stood paralysed. Eventually he managed to open his mouth. "B-but... he... first he wasn't there but now he is... it's just..."

"Seriously? First he didn't take care of you and now he does when you're old enough to have children of your own? Is THAT what impresses you?"

"U-uh... no..."

"Then what?! You know what, never mind. I don't even want to hear your stupid stuttering."

As Envy stared at him, Shrike felt very uneasy. He had no idea what had happened and could not think of anything to say.

"Just try to get this through your over-excited rediscovery of your stupid dad: I don't want to hear it, so shut up about it already!" Envy was obviously agitated but not uncontrollably furious.

Shrike just stared.

"Got it?!"

"Eh... y-yes," stammered Shrike. "I-I'm sorry."

Envy glared at him for a short moment, but they then resumed their walking.

"Um... Can I ask why you don't...? I mean, that was really sudden... And we've talked about it before during the vacation trips."

Envy had not thought about the reasons for its irritability. Before, the family issue had been neutral because Shrike seemed to have been virtually orphaned and even Linke just complained about his family though they seemed to be on relatively good terms. Now that Shrike had asked about the issue and therefore made Envy think about it, Envy saw that Shrike's new good experiences with his father annoyed it. The realisation crept up from inside Envy and it understood that it was jealous of him, and had been every time he brought the family issues up after the first time he had met his father. Envy did not want to think about the issue.

"Keep your mouth shut, human," it gritted. It calmed itself by thinking about how it would soon enough have a family of its own as well and there was no reason for it to be jealous of anything, but of course it was not like Envy could just stop feeling like it did. In addition, Envy thought that learning all the things it needed to in order to create a homunculus was incredibly wearisome. In fact, it had already given up studying alchemy twice but had this far resumed its studies after a short while.

When the two reached the mess, Shrike got his food first and went to sit at a table, but Envy did not join him. It went to some corner table and looked so uninviting that even some of the more talkative Briggs soldiers who occasionally spent time with it did not join its company.

The next day, Envy was still annoyed enough that it intentionally neglected its ventilation maintenance shift. Shrike phoned Envy's sleeping quarters to inform Linke about the issue, and Linke went to fetch Envy. He knocked on the door of its room.

"What?" came its rather rude reply.

Linke opened the door and saw Envy in a rather odd position. It was upside-down and holding itself up by just one finger. It was not on the floor but on a rack that distributed its weight on a much larger area than just the area of its finger because otherwise it would probably have gone straight through the floor or at the least bent it. It was not wearing its uniform but had the odd-looking outfit Linke had seen on their first vacation trip and on some subsequent trips. He was surprised and a little confused.

Envy glared at Linke somewhat angrily and turned itself upright before getting off the rack and kicking it to the side. "Didn't you think you should have asked what I was doing before you entered? Or asked whether you COULD enter?" it asked, still with a rude tone. It did not bother to lock its door often.

"...Shrike is expecting you at the maintenance office of mandatory machinery."

"Tell him to stop expecting me."

"Huh? Why?"

"That's none of your business. Now leave me alone."

"No. You can't just neglect your work like that."

"Watch me."

"You'll get some disciplinary action."

"Like another shift later? Whatever, I don't care. Now get."

"But... That's not how you should perform you– –"

Envy came to stand right before Linke and glowered at him. "Get out, human."

Linke looked very displeased but was intimidated enough to leave Envy alone. Envy grinned widely to itself over having made the man squirm like that.

Linke went over to the telephone and spoke into the mouthpiece. "It isn't coming."

"What? Er, why?" came Shrike's voice.

"I don't know, it didn't give any reason. It was just really irritable."

"Uh... really."

"Oh? Why, do you know what is up with it?"

"Er... Yesterday it was... I mean, I was telling it about what I'd done with my father but then it suddenly just snapped at me and yelled at me to be quiet. That was really odd. After that it avoided me."

"Huh. That sounds peculiar. Anyway, I can't force Envy to come there so I guess that's that. I'll file a note and schedule extra shifts for it. You should tell Armstrong."

"Um. Yes, sir." Shrike hung up the phone and started worrying whether he had really said something so insensitive that Envy had become truly angry with him. He told Second Lieutenant Roma that Envy was not going to come, but the old man did not even ask why; he just muttered something about everyone getting ill sometimes and gave Shrike his list of jobs.

Shrike did not run into Armstrong while performing the inspection, so he went to find her after his shift ended. Armstrong was in the weapons research and development department overseeing the latest installments.

Shrike walked up to her and could only wonder how much easier it had become to go to her and talk to her. "Excuse me, sir? Do you have a minute?"

Armstrong gave him a look. "What is your issue about?"

"Envy, sir."

"Hrm." She turned around and gestured for Shrike and Rodney to follow. They went through a door and into a corridor that was quieter than the rather noisy assembly hall. "Yes?"

"Um, Envy acted rather strangely yesterday... Actually it wasn't all that strange, but today it wouldn't come with me to a work shift and Linke told me that he couldn't force Envy to come and that I should tell you, sir."

"Hm? What exactly did it do yesterday?"

"I was telling it about my last vacation with my father when it suddenly became really angry at me. It just yelled at me to shut up, and I have no idea why. After that it wouldn't sit with me in the mess and just seemed to avoid me."

Armstrong frowned. "Do you remember exactly what you said to it?"

"Huh? Sir?" Armstrong looked expectantly at Shrike. "Um... Well, first I just said that I had been in North City on vacation. It replied it knew that, and then I said that oh, I must have mentioned that before I left, and then I said that I met my father, and that he had gotten a bullet graze on his arm but it was okay. Then I said that he'd taken me to different restaurants, and then it yelled at me loudly. It told me to shut up and asked why was telling that to it and said that I should hate my father for leaving me alone and... something. That didn't really make sense to me. I tried to ask why it had gotten so angry but it just told me to be quiet."

"I see."

"Er? Does that make any sense to you, sir?"

"It does. If you want to know, I will share the explanation with you. However, if Envy later finds out you know about this, it will probably be many times angrier with you."

"O-oh..." Shrike looked at Armstrong with a confused expression and was not quite sure whether he should stay ignorant or learn of the issue. After a short while, he decided that it was better if he knew of it, since if he knew, he could try to avoid making Envy angry. "Yes, sir, I do want to know."

"Fine. Rodney, you can leave if you wish."

"I'll stay, sir," replied Rodney.

"I am quite certain that Envy reacted the way it did because it didn't want to hear about your good family life. That is because Envy is envious of humans: the way we have loving family, trusting friends and loyal colleagues around us who help us."

"Oh... really? That... would fit with its name, but I thought it was 'Envy' because it's so good at everything and almost immortal and can shapeshift, and that's quite a lot of stuff to be jealous about."

"That is another interpretation. Do you now understand why it became angry with you?"

"I... yes, sir, I think so. It was... envious of my family..." Shrike made a very odd expression and seemed quite confused.

"What?" asked Armstrong.

"Um? I just... it... I can't believe anyone could be envious of MY family, sir."

"I can't say I'd understand how Envy's mind works, but apparently that is still the case."

"I see, sir."

"So, it got angry at you, avoided you and now didn't show up for its shift with you? Tell me if it continues doing that."

"Yes, sir."

"And it didn't get violent toward you?"

"No, sir... I was rather worried that it might but it didn't threaten me or anything and didn't get violent. It just yelled at me."

"Good."

Shrike left and went to eat and read before his physical training.

The next day, Envy did show up for its shift with Shrike. Shrike was nervous and quiet, while Envy still seemed rather irritable and likewise did not talk much.

Envy had been angry enough with Shrike to consider stopping being around him altogether, but it had soon remembered that it needed his help with its alchemy studies and felt quite annoyed because of that. Had it not needed his help, it might have just requested another partner for ventilation maintenance. Nonetheless, Shrike did not bring up his father again, so Envy figured that it would just act like he had never said anything.

As the days passed, Shrike noticed that Envy seemed to forget the tiff. It started being more talkative, complained about other things again and acted in its regular manner around Shrike.

Linke gave Envy two extra work shifts, but it did not even notice that since these days it hardly ever spent any time studying its schedule – it only checked what it should be doing next and did that.

* * *

At the end of May, Envy was bored and sitting on a crudely carved stone bench in front of the main building of the abandoned farm. It had just given up on studying alchemy to create a homunculus for the third time and was playing with a rat it had caught in the forested field. Rats were very numerous there, and Envy guessed that the reason was the former field that still had a few of the old crop plants growing on it. Envy had played around with the animal for so long that it had gone into shock from mere stress of being close to Envy. Envy placed the limp and catatonic rat on its thigh and wondered if the thing would ever recover. Envy soon grew too uninterested to continue watching the rat and ate it before anything happened.

Envy walked to the side of the house, shapeshifted so that it looked like a tall tree and spent a while looking around the dull farm environment. It saw some flies on the walls of the stone barn and some birds in the trees on the other side of the forested field. Just on the edge of the field, it could barely see two rats mating. It turned its nose up at them and felt angry.

Even rats could reproduce. Envy could not.

Envy writhed in its hatred over feeling envious of a couple of tiny rodents. Hissing, it suddenly shapeshifted a vine-like arm toward the two far-away rats and managed to take them by surprise, crushing them into a mess. Then it had to shapeshift back into human form to lower the arm because even its physiology could not support such a long appendage. It shapeshifted its arm back to normal and cleaned it while walking toward the flattened rats.

"You bloody stupid filthy maggots!" it shouted at them. It kicked some ground over them and stomped them into an even flatter pile of pulp. "Haha, stupid things, couldn't do anything about that, could you?!" It stared at the half-buried immobile legs and tails of the two rats and did not really feel much better beyond having expended energy on something physical instead of wallowing in its jealousy.

Now the rats would provide nourishment for the insects and other invertebrates as well as the plants, and they could grow and reproduce...

"Aaargh!" Envy flopped down on the ground and rolled around a few times. "Unfair! Unfaaair! So unfair!" It stopped and stayed in an odd frog-like pose while lying on its stomach, simmering and then cooling.

After a moment, Envy got up and dusted its body a little. It glanced at the rats once more and noticed that it could not tell the rats apart. What little was visible and not moulded into a shapeless mass seemed really crudely conjoined. They were kind of like a deplorably failed attempt at making a chimera.

Envy then wondered whether it could create chimeras. It did not see a reason why it could not, though it did not really know what it would even do with chimeras. It spent a while recalling how the transmutation circle to make a chimera had looked like. The circle was definitely not simple, but not all that complex either; the procedure was. The trick to interweaving two very different kinds of creatures into each other was to know both of their physiologies and know how to make the blend work. Envy naturally had rather adequate knowledge of animals since it had previously read books about them to improve its digestive system and many of them were similar enough to humans. Envy had little clue what to do with the souls of the animals, so it decided to not pay attention to them. It designed the transmutation circle on its hand and decided to test it just for fun.

Some minutes passed as Envy hunted for some more rats, most of whom had fled the scene while it had been having a tantrum. After it finally had two rats, it held one in its hand that had the transmutation circle, placed the other one on top of the first one and transmuted. The rats melded into each other and formed a hilariously malformed double rat that died after a few seconds. Envy felt amused and thought that it could try again to see whether it would be able to make the chimeras work properly. Before it started looking for some more animals to experiment on, it ate the dead double rat to get rid of the evidence.

Envy experimented on three more double rats and dissected them after making them and before eating them to find out what had went wrong. Based on its findings, it modified the transmutation circle so that it could get the organs combining better.

After its three experiments, Envy made six chimeras with its improved circle: a more successful double rat, a thoroughly failed snail-mouse because Envy did not know how snails worked, a sparrow-rat, a two-rat-one-mouse, a hare-crow and one final double rat that was successful enough that it survived the operation for at least five minutes and seemed like it would go on living for even longer, even if arduously. Envy dissected and ate them all when it was done.

Succeeding at something relatively complex made it feel better.

Envy decided to do the same the next day and played with creating chimeras. It realised that it was able to make a viable chimera only out of two or more members of the same species, and only with rodents – not invertebrates, snakes or birds. It did not find other kind of animals on which to experiment. It did not know why it could not get the other chimeras to survive longer.

Back in Fort Briggs, Envy studied some more about the physiology of the different animals it had tried to transmute and concluded that it most likely had not fully comprehended the anatomical differences of animals other than the rodents. It studied what it could of the physiology of the snakes and birds common to the kind of terrain around the abandoned farm. It also found in one of Shrike's books a certain important piece of information that helped it insert into the circle a feature that would make the transmutation of living organic material easier and more stable. Envy was sure that the feature had been in the original transmutation circle it had tried to recall, but it guessed that it had only forgotten the feature.

Envy performed chimera experiments on its two next vacation trips as well. It learned to blend the animals so that they were viable even with a cross-species transmutation. However, it could not get invertebrates to work with anything, but it did not care about that too much. From the transmutations of animals that were of a distinctly different species, it induced that when it transmuted a source animal into a target animal, the soul of the target animal remained in the chimera body and the soul of the animal that had been blended into the other was discarded. At least, that was how it looked like to Envy when it observed the chimeras' behaviour.

Regardless of how much the chimera experiments had advanced Envy's knowledge of animal physiology and given a small hint about the modification of organic material, it still did not not know how those tests would help it with creating a new homunculus. Maybe they did not help at all. But what then had been the reason for Envy creating the chimeras? Was there none?

Envy realised that it had not really even thought about why it wanted to create another homunculus. Therefore it spent some time contemplating that. There was some desire in it to just prove itself, to show that it could, but it did not think that was a very large part. Another reason was that if it succeeded, it could be more certain that it would not be the last or only one of its kind. The biggest reason for it to make a new homunculus was to ensure that some puny humans were not superior to homunculi. Humans, and everything else for that matter, could reproduce and therefore homunculi needed to be able to reproduce as well. Heaven forbid that Envy would be envious of the manner in which humans reproduced, but as it had found out right before its first chimera experiments, it did not like that there was something that all other beings in the world could do but it and its kind could not.

Nonetheless, deep down, the ability to reproduce was not what Envy was actually envious of. As Shrike had so inconveniently reminded it weeks ago, Envy was in truth still all too jealous of humans and their friends and family. It could not pretend to itself that it was not. Just being able to reproduce would not be enough. Creating another homunculus was its chance to have a family of its own without having to spend any more time agonising over its troubles in caring enough about humans and befriending them.

Thinking about a family made Envy realise that if it created new homunculi, they would technically be its second family. Its first family was dead. Should it try to recreate them somehow? Envy felt positively giddy about the prospect of bringing Lust back, but it soon considered that a homunculus's soul was in all likelihood similar to that of a human's, which meant that trying to bring back a dead homunculus was true human transmutation, and based on the available evidence, doomed to fail. Envy could pay the toll with its Philosopher's Stone, but that would not change the fact that a dead soul was not going to come back no matter what it paid.

Envy then considered creating a new kind of Lust. A new Lust could look like the original, have a similar personality and probably abilities but would not have the memories of the original Lust. Envy thought that creating a completely new creature only in the image of a dead one was certainly not an attempt to resurrect the dead one. It could just create a new soul and that would work. Envy smiled to itself. It could make a new Lust. It could make a new Greed, one that would not turn out to be such an annoying traitorous dickhead. It could make a new Pride, one that would not be such a chesty prick. It could make a new Gluttony, one with a little more brain and perhaps a bit less stomach – Envy did not have a clue as to how it could recreate his failed Gate of Truth, and it was sure that not creating that intimidating second stomach was indeed the better choice. It could make a new Sloth, one that was more interesting than the old one. And it could make a new Wrath, one that was not just a self-righteous former human with a Philosopher's Stone but a real homunculus.

Envy could even make a completely new kind of homunculus! Its ideas made it very satisfied, and for once its happiness was not just schadenfreude.

After it had floated around in its dreams, Envy got its feet back on the ground. It still needed a way to make its dreams reality. It did not know how to give the created homunculus a certain type of personality or even appearance. It decided that it would try to create a completely new homunculus first since that way it could be certain that it would not be trying to bring an old one back.

Envy needed a way to split its own Philosopher's Stone so that it would have something to serve as the new homunculus's core. It soon found out that it was not able to partition its Stone just by willing it to divide like Father had done. It was quite certain that forcibly breaking the Stone into two would not work, so it spent some time coming up with the means to manipulate and divide its Stone using alchemy. Since it almost remembered how the transmutation circle to create Philosopher's Stone had looked, it could use what it remembered to modify the basic circle that was normally used to modify materials. Designing the circle took some time and Envy was apprehensive about not being able to test the transmutation at all; it would have to get the transmutation right the first time since it only had the one Stone. It decided that the safest choice would be to divide the Stone so that it was left with two-thirds. The one-third would become the core for the new homunculus.

Finally Envy realised that perhaps the chimera experiments and the subsequent studying of animals had been useful in its journey toward making a new homunculus after all. For one, Envy thought that it should make the new homunculus's body better than a regular human's in a similar way as it had improved its own body by shapeshifting. It also realised that it could practise binding the soul to a body with the chimeras by transferring an animal's soul into another animal. Of course the homunculus would be a different case since it would have a Philosopher's Stone, but at least Envy could practise something even vaguely similar.

* * *

**Author's note:** Schadenfreude (from German): feeling of joy caused by the misery of others; Schaden: damage, misfortune; Freude: joy. The Finnish equivalent term is "vahingonilo", and the words ("vahinko" and "ilo") are the same as the German ones. (A Dilbert strip from 2006-08-07 illustrates schadenfreude nicely.)


	5. The Way

As he looked for more information on alkahestry, Shrike managed to find and acquire a publication that described the newest findings of alchemy. The publication was a new idea and only three issues of it had been published. The one that Shrike acquired was the third one because it had a small article on eastern alchemy or alkahestry as they called it. The article was rather vague, but it described some key points of difference between the two practices.

Shrike did not understand anything about alkahestry. Feeling, interpreting and using the world's "qi"? He thought it was a scam. The far-away transmutation that was made possible by the supposed qi made him very confused, but he thought that the same should be able to be accomplished with regular alchemy as well. The energy came from the tectonic movements and was available all around the world despite of location and height, so why could that energy not manifest in a far-away place as well? He had researched his thermal transmutation enough to know that he could transfer thermal energy between two far-away points, but to do that, he needed to connect at least two transmutation circles with nodes and unbroken lines. Alkahestry claimed that it would work without obvious connections between the circles. Shrike tried and tried and could not get it to work.

He wrote a rather short report of his experimentations with alkahestry and the prospect of far-away transmutation. In it, he said that unless some more scientific information of alkahestry surfaced, the stories about the world's qi and the prospect of far-away transmutation were fraudulent.

Shrike even complained about the issue to Envy one day after they had left the mess and were on their way to the library.

"I got this publication from North City. It has a funny story about alkahestry from the east."

Envy took the issue and looked at the article. "Only cluing in on it now? Figures," it mumbled.

"It has this crap about the 'world's qi' or whatever, it's completely nonsensical. Energy just flowing out of some mountaintops and what have you? It's just silly. And that far-away transmutation thing doesn't work either."

"Far-away transmutation? Hm, I've seen that."

"...What?"

"Sure, make the five focal points of a circle somehow in a place further away, then draw a circle in front of you and activate that and the effect takes place in the far-away place."

"But... I tried that but it didn't work."

Envy shrugged. "I've seen it. But it isn't like I know how that works." Envy paused while Shrike looked moderately clueless. "It isn't all that useful anyway. A bit sneakier, but so what? Why would you even bother with that?"

"Um, Armstrong wanted me to find out something about it."

"Why?"

"I don't know, she probably wants to use it as a weapon."

Envy scoffed. "Hah, regular alchemy's just as good. Probably better. If she wants alchemical weapons, why doesn't she concentrate on something marginally useful? Like... you know, making chimera soldiers or something. They're better than regular ones."

"Um... oh. Oh. But isn't that forbidden or something?"

"How would I know? And would she care whether it is?"

"Eh... the soldiers might not like it if they were forced to become chimeras..."

"So? Feeling like that is stupid. But if she cares so much, she could only do it to volunteers."

"How does making a chimera even work? Wasn't there some alchemist who could make them but they weren't good and he was killed over it?"

"Huh? Oh wait, I know about that... Tucker, right? Yeah, he was a tool. Almost reasonable ideas and really bad execution."

"Um... Do you know how to make a chimera?"

"Hm, nope. But I've seen it done so I might probably recall that transmutation circle."

"Do you mind if I tell Armstrong about this?"

Envy frowned a little. "Hrm. No. Now that I think about it, she ought to know about chimeras anyway."

"Really?"

"Hey, it isn't like I can read her mind."

"Mmh, well, I guess I'll mention it just in case she doesn't know."

Envy and Shrike arrived at the library and while Envy stayed in there to read some other books, Shrike took one of the newer alchemy books and left for his study room. Envy wondered whether it had been a good idea to mention the chimera thing, but that had been on its mind and it did not think that Armstrong would grow too concerned.

Envy was not surprised when Armstrong called it to her two days later to talk about the issue. They met in a room close to the top of Fort Briggs.

"Shrike said that you suggested making chimeras instead of finding about more about alkahestry. What do you know of alkahestry?"

"Nothing except that it works pretty much like they said in that article in that publication. You've seen that, right?"

"Yes. Shrike said it didn't work."

"Just because he doesn't know how to do something doesn't mean that others couldn't. But I have no clue how that works, I've only seen how it was done. Regular alchemy's better."

"Hrm. How about this chimera thing?"

"What of it? Shrike thought that you wanted alkahestry for a weapon and I suggested something better, that is, chimeras. Mustang and the rest of them told you about them, right?"

"Yes. I want to hear what you would tell me."

"Oh." Envy made a self-righteous smirk. "Chimeras can be made of several animals or animals and humans. The human-animal chimeras can be either static so that they look like human-animal blends, or morphic so that they can change between looking like a human and looking more like an animal. Hm, maybe they could also be made so that they could fully change into the animal." Envy looked thoughtful.

"Is there no adverse effects to the humans or animals?"

"Not that I know of. Usually a soul rejects a foreign body but I never saw that happening to a chimera. That shouldn't be an issue anyway since the soul stays in the right body, the body is just modified a bit. Oh, one of the souls needs to be discarded when combining two beings, because you things can only have one soul inside. I guess it isn't really a question of which one if one is combining a human and an animal."

"Animals have souls?"

"Really small ones, I guess."

"How can a soul be small?"

"Small so that a Philosopher's Stone made out of animals wouldn't really do much. I don't know anything about that, I was just told that."

Armstrong eyed Envy with a hint of disgust in her expression. Envy just grinned at her. "Would the morphic chimeras be indistinguishable from regular humans?"

"You should know, you've met them."

"What?" After having asked, she remembered how the chimeras she had met on the Promised Day had changed shape.

"Remember Kimblee and his entourage? Those four big soldiers were morphic chimeras."

Armstrong stared at Envy. "How do you know of them?"

"I assigned them to watch over Kimblee! Seriously, that's reeeeeally beside the point here."

"Do you know how to create a chimera?"

"I could probably find out. I remember how the transmutation circle to make them looked like. Well, almost. And obviously I can't test it in any way."

"Would Shrike be able to do it?"

Envy was rather surprised. "Huh." It had to think for a moment. "Maybe? As far as I know, doing the chimera transmutation requires really detailed knowledge of human and animal physiology. I don't think he knows much about that but that's just a matter of studying." Envy thought that it saw some spark igniting in Armstrong's eyes.

"Try to recall how that transmutation circle looked like."

"...Seriously? I'd probably need to study alchemy to be sure that the shapes and runes are right."

Armstrong looked more displeased. "Shrike can verify that stuff."

"Shrike doesn't know a bloody thing about transmuting living organic material."

"Can't he learn that?"

"First of all, there isn't much material on how to transmute living material. Second, there's a reason why nearly all alchemists are specialised in a narrow area of alchemy. If you don't believe me, ask him. He's only good at getting the shapes of screws right and that thermal transmutation he came up with."

"How then could he ever hope to create chimeras, if he doesn't understand how the transmutation circle works?"

"Alchemy is funny like that. One can use a transmutation circle without knowing whether it's perfectly right. That's a reason why some transmutations fail. If the circle is right and the transmutation fails, the reason is that the alchemist didn't know enough about the procedure. If the transmutation succeeds, the circle was right and the procedure too."

"Wouldn't it then be simple for any alchemist to copy for example Mustang's transmutation circle, the one he has on his gloves, and become as dangerous as him?"

"No, then the problem is knowing what to do when transmuting. Do you have any idea what the hell he does to be able to send flames through the air like that? Or how your stupid brother creates flawless structures with his alchemy? I've never seen anyone else creating stuff that didn't have some marks of alchemical construction."

"How do you know this much about alchemy?" she asked with suspicion.

"Common sense?" replied Envy in a disrespectful tone. Armstrong narrowed her eyes at it. "I have no idea why YOU don't know this. I guess I've picked some of the more complex stuff up when I've had to watch over some alchemists working, and I've seen Father do some transmutations and design transmutation circles." It shrugged.

Armstrong looked contemplative but could not do anything about Envy's knowledge. Not being an alchemist, she did not fully comprehend how much it knew. "So Shrike would only need the correct circle and knowledge of the physiologies of the two creatures to be merged."

"That's my guess, for now at least."

"And for you to be able to make sure that the circle is correct, you need to learn more about alchemy, is that it?"

"Yeah."

"That sounds like a lie so that I would let you read about alchemy."

Envy showed an offended face. "Geez! If you won't let me check the correctness of the circle, it's going to be frustrating as heck to find out what's off with it if I happen to not get it perfectly right on the first try!"

"So?"

"Maybe I'll just say no. As in no, I won't even try to recall that stupid circle."

"How about if I order you to?"

Envy almost suggested that then it would insert obvious errors in the transmutation circle just to hinder their progress and facilitate its work, but it stopped itself at the last moment. "You are so annoying, SIIIRRR. Why don't you order someone else to learn about transmuting organic material instead of bothering me if you're just going to make this incredibly difficult for me? Not to mention inefficient."

"Someone else? Do you have any idea what kind of people alchemists are?" Envy was surprised by the sudden change in topic, so it did not get a chance to reply. "They're power-hungry, dangerous, untrustworthy and uncontrollable. And the exceptions aren't pretty either. Edward Elric for one was an idealistic idiot, like my brother."

"...And Shrike?"

"He's not power-hungry, dangerous, untrustworthy, uncontrollable or idealistic. Therefore, as far as I'm concerned, he's the best alchemist ever."

"...But he sucks. He doesn't do anything useful with his alchemy!"

"And that is precisely the problem," snapped Armstrong with irritation. "That is why I want you to recall that chimera transmutation circle. Maybe he could do something useful for a change."

Envy stared at her for a moment. "And I'm telling you I need to study alchemy more to make it work before all of you die from old age." Envy noticed that what it had just said seemed to push some button of Armstrong's, because she got more agitated.

"Silence!" she shouted and continued in a cold tone. "Do not talk back at me."

Envy kept its face level and did not say anything, though it was rather curious as to why Armstrong had decided that she was done with the topic at this particular moment.

"Recall the circle as well as you can. If it doesn't work, we move on."

Envy showed a rather sour expression. "Yes, sir."

"When you next see Shrike, tell him to come talk to me."

"That will be tomorrow after midday."

"Good."

Envy was not very happy about the situation, but it thought it had been close to getting a permission to read about alchemy. It might get the permission if it cooperated. Over a few days, Envy spent some time making up transmutation circles that were simplified or slightly erroneous versions of the real chimera transmutation circle and gave them to Armstrong.

Armstrong pressured Shrike to study about making chimeras, but Shrike was very reluctant and did not want to play with animal and especially human lives. He was also further discouraged when he found out from Envy that in order to make a chimera, he would need to know considerably more about the physiology of humans and different animals.

Envy still pretended to Shrike that it also could not make chimeras, though it did complain to him that it probably would be able to since it knew a lot about human physiology and found animals interesting enough to study in detail. It further complained that it would not get to try just because Armstrong would flip out if she found out about its abilities. Shrike again tried to convince Envy to tell of its abilities to Armstrong but was not successful.

Since Shrike was unwilling to study the transmuting of chimeras, the issue was shelved. Armstrong told him that she was disappointed and that he should get to studying the topic as soon as possible. Shrike was just inconvenienced and wanted to come up with something else that would not risk the lives of humans or animals.

* * *

Months went by. The vicinity of Fort Briggs was almost constantly covered by snow, but the change of seasons was apparent as the length of the day changed. Summer solstice went by and the days grew shorter until eventually it was fall again.

Shrike learned to perform the transferring of thermal energy confidently and used it on a few occasions in the Fort. For some reason, even though it also tried thermal transmutation more seriously, Envy could not get the procedure to work. Shrike was rather certain that the only thing Envy was missing was detailed knowledge about thermodynamics. Envy had known the very basics and had read more about the topic but it apparently was not enough to grasp the transmutation. Envy did not see much use in the thermal transmutation and thus could not be bothered to study that further.

Instead, Envy practised transferring the soul of one animal into another and got it to work. As it continued its experiments, it also found out how to modify the chimera transmutation circle so that it could decide which of the souls to keep when it created a chimera. That helped it confirm how it would bind the new homunculus's soul into the Philosopher's Stone.


	6. I Cross the Ice Now

At the start of November in 1916, Envy was finished with its own secret research to make a new homunculus. It had planned the transmutation and made sure it knew everything it could about the subject. It had prepared a suitable spot in the abandoned farm, in the stone barn. It had also fixed the barn's missing roof. It had collected the material to make a body. Based on its escape from Gluttony's stomach, it had assessed that it did have enough Philosopher's Stone to both create the homunculus and pay a toll if it had to.

Like before, Envy had arrived in the forest with Shrike and Linke in an off-road automobile. They had left Briggs last night, and now, on the next day, Envy stood in front of the transmutation circle it had just carved on the cleaned floor of the stone barn. The materials for the body it had just deconstructed from a wolverine, a young wolf, two hares, two badgers, some rodents and all birds it had found and managed to catch while on its way through the forest. It had lost some of the water because it had not considered that it needed a vat for the water. It then transmuted some of the body materials into a vat and gathered some snow to replace the lost water.

The only thing Envy could not know for sure was how it could give the new homunculus specific knowledge, like language skills, history facts, data about animals and other pieces of information. Father had given Envy the knowledge it needed, and it had thus experienced the process, but the specifics of the information transfer nonetheless eluded it. It did have some kind of idea of how it could go about that. One way would be to copy its own brain connections meticulously, but it did not think that would be desirable. It would also rather give the new homunculus just some of its knowledge and not all its personal memories. The copying could also go wrong, since there was something unique about the way Envy's memories were formed and Envy might not be able to simply copy them physically. Therefore, it settled for trying to transfer the knowledge by just using its own wits during the transmutation.

Envy thought it had everything it needed, save for the Philosopher's Stone. It had to admit that it was afraid of performing operations on its own Stone, but it did not have a choice. It shapeshifted the transmutation circle to modify the Stone onto its hand and spent a few long moments reviewing it, verifying that it was exactly as it should be. Once Envy grew bored of checking the circle, it shapeshifted its Stone halfway out of its body and felt ridiculously vulnerable. It covered the Stone with its hand and looked nervously around itself even though it had spent an excessive amount of time checking that the surroundings were empty in the morning. After standing still for yet another moment, anxious and apprehensive of its coming actions, Envy finally transmuted.

Envy felt pain, but it was bearable. The transmutation was not destroying the Stone, but not all of the Stone came out untouched. Some energy dissipated, which meant that there was something slightly awry with the transmutation. However, Envy felt that it would still be able to finish the transmutation without losing too much of the energy.

The Stone split. The remainder of the Philosopher's Stone that was connected to Envy reshaped itself to be like it had been, or perhaps a little smaller, while the part that Envy had just cut off remained looking like one-third of its original Stone.

After shapeshifting its remaining Stone back into safety inside its body, Envy held the "new" Philosopher's Stone in its hand and just stared at it for a short moment. This little piece of red stone was the beginning of its new family.

Envy placed the Stone into the carved transmutation circle with the other body materials. It stared at the pile until it was done mulling over the procedure. Whatever happened, it thought it had prepared accordingly. It was ready. It pressed its hands on the transmutation circle, concentrating on its task.

The circle began to glow. The white-blue light glowed in the grooves and while Envy concentrated, it could feel everything organising according to its plan.

The instant the glow of the circle changed into dark violet, Envy knew that it would not end as well as it had hoped. It knew it would be drawn to Truth's realm, but it accepted that. There was nothing it could do to stop the pull at that point.

Even though Envy had prepared for the pull and had accepted it, the journey through the Gate was rough. It was much rougher than Envy expected.

Events from Envy's long life filled its consciousness, existing all at the same time and making its head feel like it would burst. In addition to its own memories, its head was getting filled with additional knowledge of alchemy, which made the trip that much harder. It could not make much sense of the information yet, but it had the awful feeling that it had made a bad mistake with its transmutation. Envy could only yell at nothing to make the flow of information stop, but its cries were in vain.

Envy found itself on ground that was not real ground. Its surroundings were white. There was nothing. It could not know what to expect; it had briefly heard about the experiences of being in Truth's realm from Edward Elric but it could not have truly known what it was like.

Envy looked behind it. There it stood, a massive black gate that resembled a smooth stone monolith. On this Gate, Envy's Gate of Truth, was an image of the Gate itself.

It turned back and saw a rather disturbing figure. It was a ghostly form of an amalgam of three of Envy's own forms: its large true form passive and barely visible in the back, its current human form in the front and its small true form lying on top of the human form's head. The figure had no eyes or other features, just a large mouth mimicking Envy's own. The figure grinned at Envy in much the similar manner as it occasionally grinned at people.

Envy did not feel like grinning.

The figure spoke. "Oh! Look at the cheater who has its own personal Philosopher's Stone."

Envy frowned and had to admit to itself that it was a little afraid. It did not show that and instead spoke questioningly. "What? What is this? Who – – Are you God?"

"Perhaps. Perhaps I am... the World. Or You. Or the Other. Or All. Or One. Or Truth." The figure continued grinning its creepy smirk.

Envy would have been sweating if it could not control that reaction with its powers. And even though it could do that, right now it felt that controlling its outward reactions was futile when it could not truly control its internal reactions. "Why am I here?"

"Why, because you failed! Trying to play god, seriously? That isn't how the world works."

Envy grimaced. "What did I do wrong? Tell me!"

"That also isn't how the world works."

"Don't play tricks on me!"

"Well boohoo, cry me a river, would you. If there's a trick, it's yours and it isn't even a very good one. Say bye to a part of your Philosopher's Stone, homunculus."

Envy felt odd. It thought it was not actually connected to its Stone like it usually was, but it thought that the feeling meant that Truth had just taken away some of its Stone. It could only stand helplessly, its face twisted with useless exasperation. Behind it, its Gate opened and shadowy tendrils reached for it.

Envy was angry. "Why could Father create homunculi? Why can I not?! I made a body, I made a new Philosopher's Stone, I created a soul and I can bind them together!" The tendrils grabbed Envy, pulling it toward its Gate, and its strength did nothing to make them stop or slow down.

Truth only grinned at it. "Nope."

Envy seethed, feverishly thinking what it was that had went wrong. What was missing?

Something was missing.

Envy knew something was missing.

"Wait!" it shouted and struggled to keep the tendrils from pulling it. "The soul! I couldn't create the soul! I need a soul for the new homunculus!"

"No kidding."

Envy was struck silent. It could leave the control of the homunculus's body to the souls of the Philosopher's Stone but thought that those souls were in no condition to do anything except be consumed as energy. Even if some were still suitable to take control, Envy was pretty sure nothing good would come out of that. The new homunculus would end up being like the lesser homunculi or like Envy's true form, only without anyone truly in control. Envy could only start arguing back. "The humans can spawn new souls by BREEDING! Those filthy maggots!" shouted Envy in disgust. "Why can't I create one?!"

"Bye bye, homunculus."

The words stung and the tendrils pulled Envy through the Gate. However, with the last crack of light from the almost closed Gate, Envy shapeshifted its arm to hold it open just a while longer and screamed in desperation. "Wait! I have one soul! MY soul! I can give it half of my soul!"

Envy saw Truth's mouth still grinning through the crack of the almost closed Gate. In dire need, it quickly shapeshifted a transmutation circle on its hand: a way to split its own soul. It thought that knowledge on how to split its soul was probably the true knowledge that it had just paid for, though it could also have known it before and only now realised that this was what it needed to do. Envy let go of the Gate and hesitated for just an instant before pressing its hand on itself and transmuting its own soul into two as the Gate closed. Even then, it could feel that something odd happened, and it was not just its soul feeling strange at being split.

The excess information still hurt Envy's brain and it could feel itself dropping.

When Envy came to, it failed to scream in terrible pain and turn around. Instead, it fumbled very badly because the right half of its body was completely missing. It started regenerating instantly, but for a short time, blood flowed from its split body and disintegrated.

"Aaaah! Aaahaaaa! Truth! Ghk-gk bastard!" it cried and tried to concentrate to make its body whole again without fully regenerating. The pain would stop once its body figured that it was whole and not missing any parts, even if its mass was lacking. It managed to reform its body in a moment and the pain stopped soon. Envy felt odd, not quite whole, but it knew that the feeling was normal when it was missing mass from its minimum weight.

Loathe as it was to admit it, Envy could see that it had been wrong about being able to create a soul from nothing. Humans seemed to just spontaneously spawn babies with souls, but Envy knew now and had known then that there was an exchange and combining of physical material that formed a new human. Envy had no physical material to give since its body disintegrated once it lost contact with its Stone or the rest of its body. Therefore Envy had to give away a part of its soul. Now it figured that it could probably have given the new homunculus a smaller soul than half of what it had had, but it was too late to do anything about that now.

After the short moment of catching its breath, Envy turned around again and lifted its head to see what had come out of its not quite successful transmutation attempt.

A figure lay on the ground inside the transmutation circle. It was still, but Envy could see that it was breathing. Envy could not yet say whether that was a good or bad thing. Somewhat dreading what it would see, it nevertheless raised itself, crawled closer and examined the newly created homunculus.

Envy had originally intended for the new homunculus to be human-looking since that would have been more convenient in its opinion. They would mostly be interacting with humans so a human-like true form ought to be the best choice. However, the new homunculus clearly was not human. Upon closer inspection, its form vaguely resembled Envy's true form, but instead of having mostly lizard-like features, it had features belonging to a mammalian animal. Envy could not help but ponder whether that was because it had extracted the material for the body mostly from mammalian animals. Envy was not sure what colour the new homunculus's skin was because its face was pale and much of the rest of its body was covered in very dark brown hair but where it was not, its complexion was dark brown. It had a black mane of some sort that ran from the back of its neck down to its backside. It also had hair on its head, likewise black in colour, and it was similar in style to Envy and Sloth's hair. Like Envy's true form, it had four arms and four legs that, while they were mostly human, somewhat resembled animal legs. It had a tail like that of a rat; long, thin and hairless. Its face resembled that of an owl, though it was featherless and thus even creepier than an owl's face on such a body would normally be. Its eyes were large and otherwise apparently a similar shape as Envy's eyes. It had no nose, only nostril slits in the middle of its face. Its mouth was almost closed, but a few sharp, pointy and animal-like teeth were just visible between its thin lips.

While Envy had not planned for the homunculus to look like it had turned out to be, one thing that Envy had not wanted it to have was indeed missing: the multitude of souls did not manifest on its body like they did on Envy's. It also was not huge but about the size of a tall, thin human. It had two interconnected nodes on its head.

The new homunculus opened its eyes. They had violet irises and slitted pupils. It looked at the barn's ceiling, then at a wall and then at Envy, from whom it did not turn its gaze away.

Envy looked keen. "Do you understand me?" It did not know whether it had managed in giving the new one appropriate information.

The homunculus stared at Envy for a while, apparently concentrating and thinking. "...Yes," it replied. "You created me."

"Hah!" Envy let out an exclamation of success and relief. "Yeah, I did." It sat up next to its creation and smiled truthfully at it. "Wow. That was some experience..."

The new homunculus looked around for a short moment and then crawled upright, sitting up next to Envy. It spent a while examining its own body.

"I didn't exactly mean for you to look like that, but it turns out the transmutation didn't go as much according to plan as I'd have liked, so... But anyway, that shouldn't be a problem. Not that you'd look bad, but sometimes it's more useful to look like a human. I tried to give you my own ability, that is, shapeshifting. Or 'tried'; it isn't like I could not give it to you since a shapeshifting body is pretty much all I understand fully. Anyway, you should try changing your shape."

When Envy stopped talking, the new homunculus looked focusedly at the floor and concentrated. For a short moment, nothing happened.

Envy continued its explanation. "You have a Philosopher's Stone at your core, okay? You should find that, be aware of it. Got it? Then you can just manipulate it, or more like everything that's connected to it, and that's your body. Come on, try to look like me." Envy stood up and continued smiling.

It took still a moment, but soon enough the new homunculus got a hang of itself and started changing. It first changed slowly and not just a little awkwardly, not quite knowing what it was doing, but as the moments passed, it changed better and eventually looked somewhat like Envy.

"Hey, that's sort of good!" said Envy. "Not quite the same but you'll get there eventually."

The new homunculus smiled with half a mouth and stood up from the floor. Envy could see that it had a perfect Ouroboros tattoo on its right thigh in addition to the obviously fake one on its left thigh that it had tried to duplicate from Envy. Envy had not intended to create the Ouroboros tattoo, but the thing was apparently unavoidable. The nodes on its head were also still there, and now that the fur on its monstrous body was not blocking the view, Envy could see that it also had a pattern of four nodes going around its shoulders.

"Hmm, okay... Listen, I tried to give you most of the knowledge I had but I'm not sure how well that worked. You know, I hadn't done anything like this before. I almost made a big mistake but I guess I just barely found a way around that in time. So, can you tell me what you know? In a roundabout manner."

"I am a homunculus, you are Envy and Father created you and six other homunculi. I know what the others are like, approximately, but they are all dead now. Father's plan to know everything failed. I know this language and Xerxian. I know what humans and animals and plants are alike. You are now working in Briggs."

"Good, good. You probably know more, right?" The homunculus nodded. "Yeah, that's great. But you don't have all of my memories, do you?"

"It doesn't feel like I do, but I don't think I can know that."

"Okay... Well, you don't know what I did with Pride in that large maintenance tunnel two hundred metres to the north from Father's chamber around 1780, right?"

The homunculus looked baffled and spent a moment thinking. "No..."

"Awesome. That was pretty private so it's better if you don't know about it or other stuff of that nature."

"I understand that." It spent another moment pondering something. "What is my name?"

"Name? Your... huh. Ha ha, I didn't even think about that!" Envy was a little surprised. "I don't know. I think you should come up with a name for yourself. Father named me and the other six homunculi after feelings or emotions that the Xerxian humans described as sins. They're our names and labels, but I don't feel like I should label you like that. So yeah, make up your own." The homunculus stood silently for a moment. "Well, if you really want me to come up with a name for you, I can. But I'd rather if you named yourself. At least then you know the name fits you." Envy waited for a while longer. "So, have you come up with anything?"

"Not yet."

"Oh. Well, take your time. It isn't like you're in a hurry." Envy looked around a bit. "Well, I better clean this up." It shapeshifted an appropriate transmutation circle on its hand and pressed it against the floor. The new homunculus also stepped out of the transmutation circle on the floor so as to not be in the way.

Nothing happened.

Envy frowned deeply and examined its transmutation circle. It changed the pattern a little and tried again, but still nothing happened. It became quite worried. "I should be able to... why isn't it working?" Envy stood up and looked at the new homunculus who looked back at it expressionlessly, and Envy figured out what was wrong. Its soul was no longer whole. It had given half of it to the new homunculus it had created. Envy turned to look at the transmutation circle on the floor again and grimaced at it. "Bollocks!" it swore.

"What?"

"I can't perform alchemy. It's because in order to create you, I had to give you half of my soul, and apparently half of what I had isn't enough to grasp alchemy. However that even makes sense," Envy explained bitterly. It sighed and continued. "Oh well. That's not your fault. But I have to destroy this somehow... Why did I have to carve it on the floor like that? I couldn't just draw it with chalk or something, noooo..." Envy mumbled as it kicked some leaves around.

After a while Envy fetched a large stone from outside and used it to smash the circle broken so that there was no way to tell what kind of circle there had been. However, it was still rather obvious that there had been a circle and that it had been crudely broken. While Envy happened to not think of that, the new homunculus did.

"Should the floor be broken even more, so that no one could tell that there had ever been even a circle?"

"Huh? Hm, you know what, that's a good point. Grab a stone and help me, eh?" asked Envy and continued smashing. The new homunculus did so and they spent quite a while smashing at the floor. Eventually the floor was mostly rubble.

"That's better." Envy looked at the new homunculus and noticed that it was a little short of breath. "You can control that, by the way. You can increase your lung capacity and air intake and make it more efficient so you don't get out of breath."

"Oh."

"And that's a pretty small stone now that I think about it. Why didn't you take a larger one?"

"This was what I could lift easily enough."

"Huh? You couldn't lift...? Oh, the human form as it is isn't particularly strong, so you need to change the place where your muscles connect to the bone to get more strength. And part is because you don't weigh very much. You can have stronger and more muscle cells if you weigh more. I made your minimum weight to be about 80 kilograms because having a minimum weight of 400 kilos like I have is pretty inconvenient sometimes, even if there are good sides too. You can increase your mass the same way as shapeshifting."

The new homunculus went ahead and concentrated to increase its mass. However, it did not seem like anything was happening. "It isn't working."

"It isn't?" asked Envy worriedly. "But... let me check..." Envy focused and increased its own mass just enough to know that it did still work, since it did not want to go all the way up to 400 kg right now.

Simultaneously, the new homunculus tried decreasing its mass. "It works the other way," it said as it continued decreasing its mass. It also made itself smaller since it felt uncomfortable with its decreased density.

Envy just stared at it, baffled. Eventually the new homunculus was just the size of a mouse. "Oh crap! I thought I was setting your minimum weight with those materials but I actually set your maximum weight."

"Is that bad?" asked its now tiny voice. It shapeshifted to look like an odd mouse.

"Well, I guess not. I think it would've been better if 80 kilos was your minimum and not maximum, but that works too." It smirked. "And small size has its uses too. You're going to have a really easy time hiding. How much do you weigh at your minimum?"

"Eight kilograms, I think."

Envy picked the mousy homunculus up. "Seems like it. That's pretty cute! Still, that's a lot of mass for a mouse so make sure you don't get stuck in the ground. I hate it when that happens to me."

Envy explained a few more practical things to the newly created homunculus, particularly that since Envy was working in Briggs and could only come to it during vacation time, it would have to spend time alone, and it should stay away from human settlements and avoid humans if any came around for any reason. Envy instructed it to eat as much as it thought it would get away with without making a huge impact on the ecosystem – even humans noticed if large amounts of plants or animals disappeared from a certain area.

Envy very much disliked that it had to leave the new homunculus alone, but it did not know what else it could do. One choice would be to leave Briggs and just disappear with the new homunculus, but it still suspected that the army would send hunters after it. It had also wondered what it would do on its own since so much of its time in general had been spent just watching humans do stupid things and laughing at them.

If Envy left Briggs, it would have to study alchemy on its own, and it did not think it would have the patience to do that. Then again, at the moment it felt like it did not need to study any more alchemy since it knew how to create a homunculus. The transmutation circle it had used was missing a way to split its soul, but at least it had already managed to do the splitting. If it needed to improve the transmutation, it thought that it could certainly find a way to incorporate the soul-splitting into the same transmutation circle that it had used to make the homunculus. But before it could even think of making another new homunculus, it needed much more Philosopher's Stone than it currently had, and had to somehow replenish its soul as well. Based on how much it had lost, it thought that it would not be able to perform alchemy in years and it would take decades to grow its Philosopher's Stone enough if it did not use humans to make a new Stone. It also considered that a homunculus probably did not need as much Philosopher's Stone as it and the new one had right now, but of course more was better.

* * *

**Author's notes:** Want to try to come up with what Pride and Envy's "noodle incident" in 1780 would be? Also, I need a name for the new homunculus!

**More author's notes: It's "science" time!** (No need to read the following, it just explains a few things about human transmutation and stuff.)

So, what counts as human transmutation that warrants a trip through the Gate of Truth is very confusing. Here is my take on it:

Confirmed Gate trips:

Trying to bring back dead people. Doesn't work, because dead people's souls are gone.

Binding someone's soul into an object. Edward did this to Alphonse.

Deconstructing and reconstructing an already existing human. Edward does this to himself in Gluttony's stomach and succeeds (he pays the toll with Envy's Stone). Envy and Ling don't get to see their Gates. Edward does it again when he goes to sacrifice his Gate to get Alphonse back.

Whatever it is that Pride does with the gold-toothed doctor and Mustang. The result is apparently that Pride loses much of his Philosopher's Stone or his body somehow starts to break down despite the Stone, the doctor is transformed into an aberration but is probably still alive and Mustang is taken through the Gate as if having performed human transmutation. Mustang has to pay the toll even though Pride paid or did something with his Stone.

Whatever Father did when he drew Edward, Alphonse and Izumi Curtis into him, though Father apparently wasn't taken to Truth.

No trips:

Making a Philosopher's Stone. Humans' souls are taken from their bodies and concentrated into the Stone. Doctor Marcoh didn't go through the Gate.

Making a human-animal chimera. The human and animal bodies are combined. Either of the souls can be put into the chimera. Tucker didn't go through the Gate and whoever else made chimeras probably didn't either.

May Chang's medical alkahestry and apparently also Doctor Marcoh's medical alchemy.

Father creating the homunculi. He made them human-like bodies and I assume he gave them a part of his soul in addition to the Philosopher's Stones.

I'm going to just ignore whatever Pride did because I have no idea about that. I'm also not entirely sure what Father does when he transports the sacrifices into him, but the sacrifices apparently go through their Gates because Alphonse meets his body. So, what is common with the other true human transmutations? Manipulating the soul, either to get it back, to bind it or to recreate it. However, most of the transmutations on the no-trip side also include some soul manipulation. Making a Philosopher's Stone only transfers the souls, but so does binding it. Father's soul-splitting is a bit dubious.

If I consider that all true human transmutations try to actually create a soul, the distinction of when a Gate trip happens and when not is clearer. Edward and Alphonse's attempt to create their mother's soul results in a trip and a failure. Edward's attempt to create and bind Alphonse's soul results in a trip but succeeds because Alphonse was only taken away but not killed. Edward's attempt to create his own soul (and body) results in a trip and succeeds because he obviously exists.

On the other hand, creating a Philosopher's Stone just transfers the souls. Making a human-animal chimera doesn't really transfer the soul, but either the human or animal soul needs to be discarded, though the extra soul can then be bound to something else. In fact, if alchemists make a chimera with an animal soul and bind the human soul into an object at the same time, that apparently doesn't warrant a trip since they don't have to create the souls but just transfer them. This was what was done to Barry. But I don't know for sure. Father splitting his soul to create the homunculi is essentially manipulating what's already there, though technically something separate is still created. It could also be that he could do that because he was a perfect alchemist and that normally it would take a trip.

Creating a soulless human body is most likely not true human transmutation and I assume it isn't. If creating a human body is not true human transmutation, then creating human body parts isn't either. Now, that implies that it would be possible to create for example limbs to serve as replacements for lost limbs. If people can create a nearly perfect interface between the human body and an automail limb, then it ought to be possible to attach an existing biological limb to someone! And it is definitely possible: Scar's brother attached his own arm on Scar. Why is that not done? I assume that the taboo of creating humans extends to human parts as well and that's also why there are no or very few medical alchemists. Or that attaching a body part somehow manipulates or creates the soul or something, but that sounds very dubious to me, especially since the attaching could be done surgically without alchemy and thus there wouldn't even be a risk of any Gate trip.

Once the taboo is lifted and medical alchemy develops, I'm sure they will be able to create limbs and attach them to people with the help of alchemy so that it's mostly painless and the limb functions just or almost as well as the original. I have no idea whether they could recreate the body part so that there would be no transplant rejection, but if they can't, they'll invent immunosuppressive drugs eventually even if it would take a lot of time. In the case of Scar and his brother, it seems like Scar's brother could change his arm to match Scar's immune system well enough, or else they were identical twins. I consider them being twins more likely.

The human body isn't too wild about foreign bodies in contact with it either. I assume they have found the suitable materials for making the body-automail interface by chance. Or Father told them which materials to use.

Furthermore, while they do exist and allow for some surgeries, I assume that the anaesthetics of the FMA universe are so underdeveloped that it's possible to create the human-machine interface only because the surgeries and pain can be spread over a long time. The attachment of a biological limb surgically would have to be done all at once and the shock of that would usually kill the person.

**End of author notes.**


	7. Interconnection

Envy went to meet the homunculus it had created during its next vacation two weeks later. It came to refer to the new homunculus as "child", mostly because it wanted to call the homunculus something, but the child took a lot of time thinking up a name for itself. Because of its much smaller mass, the child was more susceptible to cold, so Envy helped it catch a few large animals and skin them for some warming furs. It also promised to bring it some clothing the next time.

As Envy soon found out, having a family member was not what it had expected. Then again, it had not really expected anything since it had concentrated so much on the actual creation of the new homunculus and thinking about what others might think of it once they found out it too had a family, even if it was never going to let anyone know about that. That made it ponder why in the world it had even thought so much about what others might think.

The child itself was somewhat boring – kind of like Sloth. However, it did not doze off at random, even though it did like to sleep more than Envy. Despite its apparent simplicity, it was far from seeming dumb and Envy suspected that it was actually rather smart. Envy thought that the reason why it seemed boring was because it did not have any experiences to talk about. It did not have Envy's experiences or even all of Envy's knowledge. The knowledge the child lacked was rather random, so Envy could only come to the conclusion that the information transfer had not happened properly. What few experiences the child did have of imitating a rock, a bush, a lynx and other animals were amazingly dull to Envy. Of course, Envy had done the same when it had been young, so it could hardly fault the child for the elementary experiments. The child performed its studying of the surroundings while Envy was gone, and Envy was glad that the child did not seem to mind being left alone in the forest.

The child was much calmer than Envy, and Envy could not understand why. Envy figured that the child was probably better that way, since otherwise it could have been similar to Greed and they would have clashed with each other.

* * *

Back in Fort Briggs, Envy continued its work.

In the middle of November, just after it had returned from its vacation, there was an unusually long and cold blizzard. The Fort endured the weather, but Envy was slightly worried whether the child would be all right in such a storm. However, it thought that the storm probably did not reach all the way to the place where the child was staying.

Once the storm abated, a problem surfaced: in one of the top sections of the Fort, the pressure in the clean water pipes decreased dramatically and the inspectors and plumbers were very frustrated because they could not figure out what was wrong.

The low pressure problem had been present for two days when Envy and Shrike were completing a shift of ventilation shaft inspection in that particular section.

"I bet some moron has just forgotten to open a bloody valve or something. What I don't get is why it takes them so long to find which valve is closed," complained Envy.

"I hope that's what is wrong... It would be really bad if some pipe were broken and the water had been going into the Fort's structures or something."

"Can that seriously happen?"

"I hope not. I think there are safety measures to prevent that, but I know at least two places where that would happen if water got into a ventilation shaft."

"Geez. Can't you fix that?"

"It's... it's complicated. The pipes go into the mountain and there's no way to do much anything to them. Of course, water also can't get into those pipes, at least by any natural means, because water doesn't flow upwards."

"Boring!"

The two arrived at the other end of the maintenance tunnel.

"You didn't see any problems, right?" asked Shrike.

"No."

Shrike started opening the hatch, and Envy looked around. It eyed the water pipes that were right below the ventilation shafts. In this tunnel, there were six water pipes: two for cold clean water, two for hot clean water and two for waste water. Envy let the light from its torch run the length of the pipes in the immediate vicinity, and it saw something interesting some metres away.

"Hmm." It started walking toward the spot and saw that the two cold clean water pipes were joined with a short connective pipe. It looked at the connection curiously and then pressed its ear against the pipes, first the upper and then the lower. While water was definitely flowing in the lower one, in the upper one water was flowing either very slowly or not at all. There was a small lever on the connective pipe, and it was closed.

Envy could not believe the problem had really been as simple as it had thought. It twisted the lever, allowing the water to flow between the two pipes. Envy smiled smugly to itself and returned to Shrike. He had managed to get the hatch off.

"Was there something wrong?"

"Yeah, but I took care of it," it said with some arrogance.

"Oh. Um, good."

They left for the maintenance office of mandatory machinery but ran into a group of soldiers and water circulation maintainers near the water distribution centre of the section. They were discussing enthusiastically how the pressure problem had been solved, and Envy felt an urge to brag to them. It told Shrike to go ahead and take their equipment with him. Meanwhile, it stayed behind and explained its brilliant solution to the water circulation maintainers.

The water circulation maintainers were sceptical of Envy's solution, especially since the time of the fix seemed to be off – they thought they had noticed the pressure changing back to normal before Envy turned the lever. Finally Envy just took them to the place where it had found the closed pipe.

The water circulation maintainers examined the pipes and the interconnection, complained that the pipes were deficiently labelled and sent two people to the nearby maintenance tunnels to find out the correct labels. They also found out that the pressure and flow sensors in the tunnel were malfunctioning. After they had managed to replace the sensors, they tried closing and opening the connective pipe and found out that the pressure was better when the pipe was open, but it did not account for the complete normalisation of the pressure.

Envy left the scene, happy that it had solved such a simple problem while no human had managed to do anything – even if it had only happened to run across the closed pipe by luck.

After going to grab something to eat, Envy headed for its shift of standing guard on the top of the Fort. Ever since Envy had let Second Lieutenant Russell know that it could see in the dark, it had been assigned to stand watch during the night and bad weather. The night did not bother Envy, but it did not like the cold storms. Nonetheless, standing watch in a storm and in the night also had a good side because then people bothered it less.

This time Envy had an evening shift. The previous storm had ended over a day ago, but a new one had brewed just before Envy's shift and the weather seemed to just get worse and worse by the minute. Envy sighed but went to its post.

After just an hour, it noticed a figure approaching it. It saw soon enough that the person was Armstrong, and she was accompanied by Rodney and some other soldier who had a shift of standing guard.

"So, I hear you solved the water pressure problem in sector 12-C," she said icily. She spoke loudly to be heard over the storm.

"Yeah, I did!" said Envy happily. "Such a simple solution. Those plumbers sure were stupid to miss that."

"I suppose next you will claim that you didn't know they both were NOT clean water pipes and that your intention was not killing anyone in the Fort?"

Envy had not expected that. "...What?"

"You connected a clean water pipe to a pipe that had only superficially cleaned waste water! Be glad that it was discovered quickly and that the worst that managed to happen was a few sudden cases of severe stomach flu. Otherwise I would have to dispose of you."

"What? What?! Are you freaking kidding me?! A pipe CONNECTED the pipes of clean water and waste water?! How in hell can that even have – –"

"And I'll give a taste of what you could expect," said Armstrong calmly, speaking over Envy and not caring at all that Envy was not listening. She stepped aside, and Rodney promptly threw a bucket of liquid on Envy. Envy had not even paid enough attention to him to notice that he had been carrying a bucket.

Envy's clothes absorbed most of the liquid, but some of it made contact with Envy's skin and especially its face. The liquid evaporated very quickly and combined with the rising storm, it drained heat from Envy's body so effectively that its face and some parts of its body froze and cracked. Its left hand fell right off as it tried to bend it at the wrist. "Aaaaahhh! What the hell!? Aaargh!" It stumbled backward and the movement made more of its body crack. Parts of its clothing tore and broke as well.

Armstrong continued speaking while Envy groaned and regenerated. "I have no idea what that connective pipe was doing there and whoever did put it there was a thundering idiot! Nevertheless, EVERYONE ELSE in the Fort would have had the sense to first tell the water circulation maintainers about it and not take matters into their own hands! Did you not think about the consequences of your actions at all? The waste water is dangerous, deadly even. People could have died, and it's still possible that those who became sick will."

"Ow! Ow! You humans are so stupid! Imbeciles!" screamed Envy. "If I had thought for a second that there would even exist a pipe that connected clean and waste water, I'd be nearly as stupid as you things!"

"And even if both the pipes had been clean water pipes, you didn't happen to think of, say, that the pressure differences in the pipes could have caused a rupture in one of them when you opened the valve?"

"What?! WHYYYYY IS THAT CONNECTIVE PIPE THERE, I just ask!" shouted Envy furiously. By now, it had fully regenerated again, though some of its clothes were still frozen.

For a moment, Envy and Armstrong just stared at each other, Envy pretty much ready to jump at her throat and she waiting until it was calm enough to listen. "The next time you cause a big and convenient 'accident', I will make a grotesque ice statue out of you. I cannot tolerate these kinds of mistakes from you. Do you understand?"

Envy glared at Armstrong, its face tight, eyes hateful and teeth showing. It said nothing, but eventually straightened itself and stood in a relatively neutral pose.

"Have I made myself clear?" asked Armstrong again.

Envy still said nothing, but now it turned its face away and looked into the storm. After only a short while, it started walking and went past Armstrong, Rodney and the third soldier. Its frozen clothes cracked and cut its skin a little. "Ow! Darn it," it muttered. It headed back inside. Once inside, Envy went into a corridor where there was no one to see it and started taking its clothes off but shapeshifted so that it still looked like it did have a uniform.

Armstrong and Rodney followed it.

"I hate you all! I just wanted to help, and this is what I get!" exclaimed Envy in a hostile manner as it threw the frozen pieces of clothing around. They had warmed up enough so that they did not crack more upon impact.

"I would appreciate your help if you did not make things worse by trying," replied Armstrong in a scathing tone. "I accept your claim that you didn't know what you were doing. If I believed that you intentionally tried to kill us, you would be dead now."

Envy felt needlessly offended. Did she really think she could have killed it? Hurt, sure, but not killed. That was preposterous. "Why'd you even have to throw that liquid stuff on me? If you had done it to some puny humans, you'd have killed or at the least seriously maimed them!"

"You're not a human and you would not have reacted to anything less. Would you even have listened if I said something like 'Bad Envy, please don't do that again?'" she asked and seemed frustrated. "If any of those who got sick die, I'm going to put you in the brig for a few weeks to discipline you. I expect no protests about that. None," she gritted and glared at Envy very harshly. "Next time, think at least twice before you take such rash actions."

"That connective pipe should NOT EXIST!" screamed Envy and threw its trousers at Armstrong. She stepped aside without really putting any effort to it and let the clothes hit her on the shoulder. Envy stared at her with contempt. "Give me some stupid authorisation paper or something so I can get a new bloody uniform and go back up there to count all those moronic snowflakes," it said and held out its hand.

Armstrong looked at it very disdainfully but then nodded at Rodney. Rodney took off his gloves and retrieved some paper and a pen from his pockets. He wrote the note and placed it on Envy's hand crudely.

Envy wanted to tell them that it would never, under any circumstance, try to help anyone again. However, it swallowed the words and merely stomped away after collecting the broken clothes and squeezing the note in its hand. It probably left a few dents on the metal floor, but it really did not care at the moment.

When it reached the equipment office, Envy was glad that Pommern was not there. At night time, there were only two privates working in the storage and they took their time gathering Envy's equipment. Of course, Envy was in no hurry to return to its duties. Once the privates had given it all it needed, it went and took the broken uniform to its room. Maybe Shrike could fix it with alchemy and then Envy would have two outfits.

The following week Envy was extremely irritable, spoke very little, stayed away from everyone and otherwise tried to be as boring as possible. However, being like that got on its nerves, so as soon as it had not heard comments about the connective pipe for a while, it gradually got back to normal. Shrike decidedly kept very quiet about the issue. The people who had gotten ill because of the tainted water got better.

Shrike fixed Envy's old uniform. Envy considered taking the clothes to the child but decided that doing that would be too conspicuous. Instead, it snatched one of the old furry overcoats that the ventilation maintainers used since no one kept too keen an eye on them. It brought the coat to the child on its next vacation.

* * *

While Envy was reading more about transmuting extraordinary materials, it pondered what had went wrong when it had split its Philosopher's Stone and how it could have performed the operation so that it would not have lost any of the Stone's energy. The book naturally had nothing on performing transmutations on Philosopher's Stone and Envy knew it, but it still found the lack of information on the Philosopher's Stone annoying.

Then Envy finally realised that it could have practised making Philosopher's Stone by using animals, and practised the splitting transmutation by using the Stone of animals. It was so happy about its realisation that it felt like skipping around, but at the same time it was angry with itself for not having thought of the idea before making the new homunculus.

* * *

**Author's note:** The event in this chapter was pretty much taken from real life, so if it seems silly, you can blame reality! There's a Wikipedia article called "Nokia water supply contamination" about the case. Here it was known as Nokian vesikriisi (Nokia's water crisis).


	8. Psychology and Physiology

When Envy had first come to Fort Briggs and had started the close combat training, it had decided to try to keep its supernatural qualities secret. It could well refrain from obvious shapeshifting even if it would have liked to do that, but its mass was much harder to hide. Therefore it just did its best in being careful, though some people of course wondered why it seemed to weigh so much.

During the training sessions, Envy most often sparred against its unit leader Captain Blohm since he was one of the few people who knew what it was and did not care much at all that he ended up losing against it because of its strength and perceived endurance. Envy's fighting technique had not developed much over the years: its tactics had mostly been to shapeshift and incapacitate its targets instantly, either by overpowering or confusing them, or to let a debilitating blow through so that it could take the attacker by surprise right after. However, as the training sessions went by, it finally started learning something new and for once it did not mind that too much. Blohm managed to teach it to conceal its supernatural qualities better. Now, instead of taking a blow, Envy blocked it rather aggressively and retaliated then, which did not reveal its true nature nearly so easily, even if its fighting skills still left a lot to be desired.

Blohm often muttered something about how people with great offensive capabilities never bothered to learn to defend properly. Such people were what he called glass cannons. Envy of course did not consider that to apply to itself because it was nearly immortal. While Envy did learn some things, it still had little patience to endure the human training rituals and trouble accepting that humans could be better combatants than it. Before last year, it had never actually fought against a human that would not fall to its tricks, so it was therefore unused to the whole idea.

There was also another soldier in Blohm's squad who was a fairly good partner for Envy. He was Lance Corporal Danton, a large and muscular man with more brawn than brain, though even he was not very daft. He had a temper similar to that of Envy. He was a more skilled fighter than it but could obviously not do anything about its mass or its other small abilities like extreme double-jointedness which was easy to simulate with very minimal shapeshifting.

During their first few fights months ago, the other soldiers had been surprised that Envy could beat Blohm and Danton. Some had congratulated Envy, but as it later became clear that it was normal for Envy to win, they started taking it for granted. Of course Envy felt satisfied about its wins, but it was more surprised at the way the others reacted. They did not laugh at Blohm and Danton for losing. Instead, they gave tips to both them and even Envy as much as they could. That was how the soldiers tried to improve their skills.

Envy had difficulties accepting advice from the humans, but it at least listened to them and did not derisively dismiss them instantly, even if it told itself in its mind that their talking was inane nonsense. Since the other soldiers were so keen on giving tips, Envy started doing it as well, though it did so in a not-very-respectful manner. Luckily, or perhaps unluckily, it was rather perceptive of others' faults and its analyses and tips were often annoyingly spot-on.

What helped Envy moderate its advice and responses was seeing how Danton reacted to it winning him every time. He was often bitter and angry at Envy and called it out on cheating or pretty much anything, blaming everything else for his failure except himself. Envy did not even bother mocking him further since he made a good job of it himself. After that kind of display, it thought that being all cool, rational and helpful about his deficiencies would infuriate Danton the most, at least in a way that would be acceptable behaviour in the context of combat training. Envy succeeded well enough and Danton occasionally threw some tantrums or attacked Envy again.

Envy soon discovered that voicing out its advice was surprisingly effective for learning fighting, not so much for the humans but for itself. Especially its advice to Danton more often benefited itself rather than Danton.

Blohm left it unmentioned that Envy would have acted just the way Danton did if someone did to it what it did to Danton.

When Danton once managed to beat Envy so that it could not get out of the situation without very obviously revealing its abilities, it was first furious and resented Danton and his smug face, quite ready to take him out all the more violently on the next round of fighting. A few people congratulated Danton, but more people offered Envy tips on how to avoid a similar situation. One even said that it was good to know that everybody, even Envy, had room for improvement. Surprised that no one laughed at it even a bit, Envy did not know what to think of the situation and was confused about it for some time. Eventually it just let the events go by.

Envy finally understood that the training was just that: training, and that it was okay to lose. Of course, Envy did not like losing even during training. What it started doing then was trying out some new moves and strikes that it did not think would be very effective, to see whether they would after all be usable in some situations. To its surprise, some of the moves did turn out to be good enough to be used in serious situations as well.

* * *

Envy sometimes stayed in the large gym hall to practise acrobatic feats and other means of controlling its body without shapeshifting. It had discovered quickly that if it screwed up, the other people in the hall did not make fun of it for some reason, just like the soldiers in its unit had not mocked it during the close combat training. Envy had been certain that they would. It had laughed at the others a few times, but stopped once it noticed that no one else did that. The biggest reactions were that the people asked whether it was okay if it had fallen in a bad-looking manner. A select few offered Envy advice if they had seen a flaw and were brave enough to talk to it. Envy listened to them, but was not exactly grateful for their interventions to its sessions.

One more thing Envy found annoying was that it had to be very careful with the premises. Even though parts of the gym hall floor were concrete or even bedrock, they were covered with slightly less durable material and Envy had to make sure its weight would not create suspicious cracks or cause other structural damage to the floor or the equipment it sometimes liked to abuse. If only it would not have to care about that and it could just fix the damage with alchemy, but no. Then it wondered why there had not been even one halfway decent alchemist in Briggs before Shrike, especially since Armstrong liked to collect competent people. It could not know the reason for certain but assumed that Armstrong had not been able to trust any alchemist enough to allow them to work for her before, since she had complained that alchemists were too unreliable and power-hungry.

One day in the middle of December, Shrike had one of his sparse close combat training sessions. He came into the hall with his commanding officer First Lieutenant Massena and the rest of her unit. For a change, Envy was there practising miscellaneous things, even though it should have been in the library reading at that time. It had just ended a long jump approximately in the middle of the hall.

"Warrant Officer Envy? What are you doing here?" asked Massena.

"Spending my time," it replied with a shrug.

"I see. We have a training session, so stay out of the way. Or take part if you like."

"Eh, not interested. I'll go over there." Envy walked to one side of the large hall to practise with other equipment and perform some less conspicuous jumps. It once again wondered how it would be like to jump on the trampoline but reminded itself that the poor piece of equipment would just break.

At this point, Envy noticed that Shrike was with the group. He looked at it a little oddly and it smirked at him.

Massena directed her subordinates through a combat exercise routine. First they just warmed up, but after they had started fighting, Envy watched them curiously. There were three people who were not ridiculously larger than Shrike, so he just sparred with them. He was obviously feeling more energetic and seemed to try his best to not get beaten. Still, one by one the three others who fought against him conquered him. Another somewhat small man was stronger than him and kept so busy as to not let him even try to retaliate. Massena was just very skilled and twisted him to the floor several times but took her time to try to help him improve. He just looked inconvenienced and did not seem to learn anything. The third one was not a good fighter but had a lot of weight and settled for sitting on Shrike. Envy chuckled at the sight.

For some reason, Shrike got uncharacteristically vocal just before the third round of fighting ended. "Get off me! Get off me!"

"What?" said Posen, the man who was holding Shrike in place. Posen was both surprised and annoyed.

"Don't! Sit! On me!" shouted Shrike and tried to push the other man off without succeeding. "I'm so tired of you always doing this bloody thing!"

"Be less of a pushover then," said Posen, returning the insulting attitude.

"I always hit you when you come at me, you'd be dead if I had a knife or something. Then you just roll over m– – Owhhh!" Posen rolled some more and managed to press Shrike so hard against the floor that his ribcage compressed and air escaped his lungs.

Massena had been about to tell Shrike to shut up, but now she instead spoke to Posen. "Posen, get off of him. What is the problem here?"

Shrike groaned as Posen stood up. "He's upset that he's lousy at fighting," said Posen.

"Guh..." Shrike tried to say something back, but at the moment, his chest was hurting too much. Massena turned him around and felt his ribcage. "A-agh!" He grimaced with pain.

"That hurts?" said Massena. "I can't feel anything broken. Rest for a few minutes and see if it gets any better."

"Just learn how to fight," commented Posen.

"Screw you," said Shrike. "You're worse, you fight so stupidly. If I had a knife or hit you in the face, you'd – –"

"But you don't have a knife! That's not the point of the exercise."

"Shut up!" said Massena. "You both have a point and you're both wrong. Yes, we don't use weapons or hit in the face in this exercise, but that doesn't mean you can't try to protect yourself better," she said to Posen and then turned to Shrike. "And you shouldn't fall for his simple technique every single time. Try to roll with him or evade him and twist him down. I've showed you how for who knows how many times." She then got up and started going on about the next part of the exercise.

Shrike breathed angrily before getting up and walking a little to the side. He sat down and felt his ribcage, but he could not really say whether anything was broken. He still hurt considerably.

Envy walked to him and sat down next to him. "That was kind of funny."

Shrike sighed. "No, it wasn't."

"Why don't you just do what Massena says? She obviously can make it happen and she isn't much stronger than you. Or maybe she isn't any stronger than you, I don't know."

"Eh! That's easy to say. It doesn't work so smoothly when he comes at me."

"Uh-huh. I suppose you are a pushover then."

Shirke just huffed with anger.

"Did he break your ribs or what?"

"I don't know... Massena said she didn't feel anything broken, but it hurts." Envy grabbed his ribcage and twisted it painfully. "Ow, ow! Stop!"

"Hmh, well, she was right," it said as it let go of him.

"Ow... huh... How do you know?"

"I've held plenty of broken ribcages. It's pretty funny to break a ribcage one rib at a time, you know?" it said with a grin.

Shrike was not usually one for inflicting pain for entertainment, but at this very moment, he was imagining crushing Posen's ribcage with a wrench.

Envy watched the other soldiers fighting for a minute. "Huh. You know what you should do when Posen comes at you and you have no weapon? You should drop to the ground, trip him and then lunge for his arms and twist them."

"Drop down? But then he'll just step on me!"

"That's why you have to do it suddenly, just before he grabs you, and hit his feet right away. He'll just keep going to the direction where you just were. Because if there's anything bad about weighing a lot, it's that. I of course weigh so much that my legs would just keep going through some puny human body, but I've tripped on stuff like fallen trees."

Shrike frowned and looked contemplative. "M-maybe I could try that..."

"Wait, it would be funnier if you tripped him and then laughed at him. Then he'd charge at you again and then you could trip him again and laugh at him again!" said Envy, obviously amused.

Shrike rested for another minute before joining the others. Next they performed specific manoeuvres so Shrike could not try the new trick right away. Envy grew rather bored and did not stay to see how Shrike would perform.

* * *

Envy and Shrike had a shift of ventilation shaft maintenance the next day.

"So, did you manage to trip that fat guy yesterday?" asked Envy once they had left the maintenance office.

"Hm... Well, yes, almost. He fell on me." Envy chuckled. "He was a bit angry about that. Then I decided to try it on Massena too when she ran at me and I managed to trip her, but she just rolled over me after she fell and got up right away. But I guess I almost had a chance."

"I guess that's not bad then. Hm, you suck at close combat so much, but do you also suck at shooting a gun? It's combat too but a different kind."

"Eh, I'm better at shooting than at close combat. I haven't paid attention to how good I am at that actually... I don't really care that much since I'm good enough at it."

"Huh, right."

"But I've never actually shot anyone, any person. Or even an animal. Maybe I'd accidentally miss more often if I had to shoot at people. The closest I've been to shooting anyone was when the Drachmans attacked last year and I helped reloading one of the machine guns. We didn't even shoot much since they were so passive. A few explosives and they were done with."

"Heh heh. I bet you'd waste your ammo and intentionally miss everyone you tried shooting at and you'd be devastated if you actually hit them by accident."

Shrike sighed and seemed a little irritated. "Um... How about you? Are you good at combat?"

"Oh, sure! I'm pretty good at it. Okay, if I don't use my shapeshifting abilities at all, it's possible for me to lose to a human but that's pretty darn rare."

"How did you get so good?"

"Talent! But of course I've learned some more stuff and got some information otherwise."

"Mh... but Linke says that everyone can learn to be an estimable fighter."

"Sure, but those with talent will still be better, especially if they learn more too." Saying that out loud made Envy frown strangely. It thought it was a very skilled fighter, but it could not deny that it had learned more about fighting and that it could still learn more. It had already started doing that in the Fort and it could continue doing that, though for that it needed to tolerate the other silly soldiers and perhaps even listen more closely to what they said in case some of their advice could apply to it by chance. That sounded rather frustrating, but it was an opportunity nevertheless. Envy wondered whether it could be as good as Wrath. A considerable part of the man had been human, so it had not liked admitting that he was a better fighter, but it had not tried to delude itself into thinking otherwise.

Shrike did not notice Envy sinking into its thoughts since he was also thinking about what Envy had said and made some groundless rationalisations in his mind. His attitude problem was the biggest issue that prevented him from becoming a more formidable fighter, but he thought that since he also had no talent for fighting, it was almost pointless for him to try.

"How about shooting? Are you good at that?" continued Shrike.

"Oh yeah. I always hit the centre of the target. Or the head or heart if it's a human-shaped target."

"Even outside?"

"Well, the stupid wind and snow complicate things."

"Yeah. At least snowfall will aid with interpreting the wind since it's easy to see how the wind is blowing if you watch where the snowflakes are going."

Envy had not thought about that. "Oh."

"But it's not like that helps all that much. There'll always be gusts of wind and other problems, so shooting accurately outside over a large distance is pretty much impossible. Luckily we don't really need to since the explosives need to just go approximately to the right spot."

"Yeah, those tanks are pretty effective like that. What they end up doing is quite a lot like the explosions Kimblee made. Remember him?"

"Hm? Oh, that weird alchemist who was clad all in white and was here last year? I never caught what he did."

"Yeah. Hm, were you even here last year?"

"Of course, but I recall I had a nasty case of influenza around when he was here. No, it was after that... I was working overtime with ventilation because... because I don't even remember why any longer, and then I got sick and spent like a week in the medical room, and after that a week in my bed."

Envy chuckled. "Geez, how does that even work? Why do you humans get sick?"

"Um... there are some harmful viruses and bacteria everywhere and sometimes they just attack the body. I don't really know much more than that. I know that when we get fever, it's an attempt to burn the viruses or bacteria out."

"But fever raises your temperature by just a couple of degrees."

"Well, any more than that and our own cells would start dying, I guess. Or proteins. But apparently the fever is enough most often. So... Don't you ever get sick?"

"Nope."

"Not even tired or a bit nauseous or anything?"

"Nope, not like that. Hm, well, I've eaten poison or something before, that was rather annoying. It took a longer time to get rid of that than it took to regenerate from a wound. It took like two minutes, maybe even more!"

Now Shrike felt so estranged from the topic that he could not figure out anything to reply.

They arrived at their inspection site and climbed into a maintenance shaft. Somebody had reported that the ventilation was inefficient, and it was not difficult to locate the reason: someone had closed a valve on a pipe without aligning the pipes properly, and the pipe had cracked and a part of it had fallen out.

Shrike was annoyed and looked at the fallen part. "Okay, whoever was here the last time is going to get a note." He picked up the piece and his expression changed. "I hope it wasn't me..."

Envy huffed and leaned on a wall.

Shrike held the piece over the hole and concluded that there was nothing else missing. "Can you open the valve?"

"Sure." Envy started twisting the valve while Shrike dug through his bag to find the transmutation circle he could use.

"Wait a minute... What? Where are my circles? And the sketchpad? I can't find them." Shrike went through the contents of the bag again but could not find them. "Um, are they in your bag?"

"No," said Envy without even looking into its bag.

"Dang it. I think I took them out before we left to put the ventilation machine manual in and forgot to put them back. Um, can you fix it instead? It's not complex or anything."

This far, Envy had managed to hide from Shrike the fact that it could not perform alchemy any longer. It had told him that fixing pipes and reforming screws was boring, and Shrike had not protested. Now it had no real excuse. Welding was much more work than transmuting. Envy still tried. "Can't you just draw the circle on your hand?"

"What? Why would I do that?"

"Obviously so you don't have to carry the circles around all the time!"

"Oh... But why can't you just do it? It's not that bad, right?"

Envy eyeballed Shrike and felt very annoyed. If it did not admit that it could not perform alchemy, he would grow too suspicious. "I can't do alchemy any longer," it muttered.

"...What? Why?"

"I'm not even sure," said Envy irritatedly as it lied. "I noticed it two days after the vacation before the last."

"But that was two weeks ago... Why didn't you tell about it?"

Envy gave Shrike a mean eye. "Like that would be something I wanted to tell to people."

"Uh... But how is it possible to just lose the ability to perform alchemy? Don't you have any idea why that might have happened?"

Envy stared at Shrike and was very annoyed at having to think up some kind of plausible reason or speculation. Eventually it went with a very trimmed-down part of the truth, wrapped in a convenient cover story. "I cut off a part of myself on the last vacation. I have no idea how that could affect my ability to do alchemy but that's the only thing I remember that could have done it."

"You... WHAT?"

Envy started at Shrike as if he was a moron, but then it just grinned at him. "Didn't I tell this to you or did you think it would only work for small injuries? I said that I regenerate. That includes regrowing body parts. If a part of me is destroyed, it just grows back."

Shrike looked pale. "O-oh... Is... is that because you... you have a Philosopher's Stone?"

"You know about the Philosopher's Stone now? You didn't seem to the last time when we talked about it." Envy stared introspectively at the ceiling. "Huh. That was over a year and a half ago..."

"Um... Armstrong told me last winter that you have one... at your core, or something. And that it's made of living people."

Envy made half a smirk. "Yeah, that's pretty much it."

"So, you can regenerate because of the Philosopher's Stone?"

"Yeah."

"That must be awesome. Not having have to worry about getting hurt or anything."

"Eh, it doesn't work quite like that. The regeneration isn't instantaneous and it hurts like hell."

"Why would you cut off a part of yourself then?"

Envy gave Shrike another dirty look. "I was lifting a big rock, okay? It slipped from my hands and squished most of my body."

"Oh... That must've sucked."

Envy rolled its eyes a bit at the obvious comment.

"Do you think you'll ever be able to perform alchemy again?"

"I don't know. Maybe. I've gotten parts of myself cut off before, so it'll probably come back to me at some point, if it's because of that thing." Envy made itself sound resentful.

Eventually, to avoid having to set up the welding gear, Envy carved the circle on the side of the pipe and Shrike transmuted the pipe, fixing it.


	9. Hidden

At the end of December 1916, Armstrong called Shrike to discuss with her. This time Rodney was not with her and instead waited outside the room in which the two met. The room was next to ventilation machinery that took fresh outside air in and warmed it. The machines hummed behind the room's walls.

As per her style, Armstrong got right to the point. "Do you know of an abandoned farm somewhat close to the place where you go when Envy has its vacation?"

Shrike looked a little confused since he could not guess why Armstrong was asking something like that. "Um, no, sir." Armstrong stared at him. "Uh... Should we look for one, sir? We can, if you'd like."

"There's no need, it's already been found. Have you created a homunculus, another creature like Envy?"

Now Shrike's jaw dropped and he stared at Armstrong, becoming a little pale. "What? N-no, sir."

"Is it possible for you to do that?"

"Wh– – I don't know how, sir. I-I've never seen anything like that in the books..."

"Envy presumably knows something of the subject. Either way, Major General Mustang claims to have found a previously unknown homunculus in an abandoned farm near your vacation spot. If you did not create it, do you know of anyone who could have?"

"..." Shrike seemed somewhat frightened. He did not yet make full sense of the situation. "I don't... what?"

Armstrong gave a small sigh of frustration. "Homunculi are artificial humans created through alchemy. Envy is a homunculus. Mustang found another homunculus near the vacation spot. Envy may know something essential to aid in creating another homunculus. Is there anyone else that you know of who could perform such a feat? Or anyone who could perform alchemy at all?"

Shrike stood with his mouth open and could feel all blood draining from his face. The blood packed up in his brain as his mind tried to wrap itself around the situation. He would have to say that he knew that Envy could perform alchemy, but it had asked him not to disclose that fact, and thus his thoughts were locked in conflict. How could he lie to Armstrong? He had previously imagined himself capable of it, even if only barely, but now that the situation pressed on him, he found he was unable to lie.

Of course, Shrike also did not want to let Envy down, so he just stood silently while the conflicts were flaring up furiously.

"Okay, that expression tells me that you DO know of someone who could do it. Who is it?" asked Armstrong.

Shrike's voice trembled and he struggled to get anything out of his mouth. "I... I promised I wouldn't say, sir."

Now Armstrong looked marginally surprised. "You promised? Really? Well, this is a matter of Briggs security, military security and perhaps the security of the whole bloody world, so you better tell me before it's too late."

Shrike thought whether it was appropriate for her to exaggerate like that, since it sounded like an excessive hyperbole to him. Still, it was incredibly hard to not take her seriously. "...T-the world?"

"Yes, Shrike! I'm not playing around with you."

"But how c– –"

"You don't need to concern yourself with that now. Who is it?"

Shrike was still silent for a long moment before he managed to say it. "E-E-uh, Envy, sir."

"WHAT?!"

Shrike felt as if his heart had just tried to flee right through his spine. He took a step back from Armstrong.

"Envy created another homunculus?!" she shouted.

Shrike just stared wide-eyedly at her and could not get a word out of his mouth – not that he would have had anything to say at that precise moment. He had never seen Armstrong as displeased as she was right now.

"It shouldn't be even able to perform alchemy!" Since Shrike did not speak, she started issuing commands. "Shrike, I need you to make this half of the room and everything in it extremely cold. Can you get inside the walls and draw whatever transmutation circles you need to, so that they are not visible from this room?"

Shrike was confused by the sudden change in topic but welcomed it heartily since he had no idea what he could reply to Armstrong about Envy. Concentrating on something else would mitigate his anxiety. "Y-yes, sir."

"How many transmutation circles do you need?"

"Just one, sir. Preferably in the ceiling."

"Good. Can you activate the circle at a distance?"

"Like they described in that article about alkahestry? No, that's impossible, sir."

"How far away can you position yourself and still activate the circle so that it works?"

"Hm... If I can make a more complex route with more transmutation circles, I can transfer the energy through that route and then I can activate the circle system at any point on that route."

"Then create a suitable route from this room to the next room on the east side."

"Will I direct the heat there, sir?"

"How hot would it get?"

"Er, it doesn't quite work that way, sir. I can heat one particular spot so much that it melts or even vaporises, but vaporising metal isn't a good idea. I can also heat the whole room and its walls but I wouldn't want to be in the place where the heat goes if I have to freeze an entire room."

"Can you direct the heat to the outer wall of the Fort then? It's right beyond the corridor over there. It should be big enough to divide the energy more evenly."

"Yes, sir, but I need a some sort of conductive path to the wall."

"There is none as far as I know, but you can create one. Make sure it breaks nothing and that you can remove it later."

"Yes, sir. And this half of the room should be sealed, then it's much easier to concentrate on this place only."

"That can be done, there is an emergency bulkhead over here. Is that it? How soon can you have all that done?"

"I guess in half an hour, sir."

"Do it."

"Yes, sir." Shrike drew out a ladder that was attached to the wall, climbed to the ceiling and opened the hatch that was there. Armstrong assigned two soldiers to assist and watch him.

Half an hour later Shrike was finished. Armstrong then called Envy to discuss with her and started repeating the interrogation she had just conducted to Shrike.

"Mustang's people say that they found a previously unknown homunculus from an abandoned farm relatively close to the place where you go on your vacations. Is this true?"

When Armstrong had said the word "homunculus", Envy's expression had twitched from the shock and Envy could not say whether it had been a revealing or surprised twitch. Numerous questions flooded its brain, but its self-preservation came on top for now and it tried to deny its knowledge.

"What? There's another homunculus?!" it exclaimed, trying its best to not express fear or worry of having been exposed, but enthusiasm for having learned of the existence of another homunculus.

Armstrong stared sternly at it. "So you don't know anything about this new homunculus?"

"No! Where is it? What's it like?" it demanded.

"And you don't know of an abandoned farm near the place of your vacations?"

"No! Why are you asking that? I don't care about any farms! Do you know where that homunculus came from?"

"Why are you so sure this homunculus even exists?"

"...Were you lying to me about it?" Envy stared somewhat offensively at Armstrong and sounded disappointed.

"I said that Mustang said that he found something." She frowned. "If you knew enough about alchemy, would it be possible for you to create a homunculus on your own?"

"What?" Envy pretended to be baffled at her direct questions. It left it at that and waited for Armstrong to speak.

"Shrike told me you can perform alchemy."

"WHAT? And you believed him?" it asked, looking at her like she was being nonsensical.

Armstrong definitely believed Shrike over Envy and now that she had caught Envy trying to lie, even if it did so in a round-about way, she had no reason to think that Envy was speaking the truth about not knowing anything about the newly-found homunculus. Still, she was very displeased about how convincing Envy's lies had sounded. "It's such a shame!" she shouted very disappointedly. At the same time as she said that, she grabbed her sheathed sword and used it to hit a panel in the wall. The panel slammed open and a jet of extremely cold air engulfed Envy. Almost immediately afterwards, another panel opened in the opposite wall and a directed stream of rapidly evaporating liquid came at it. A third panel in the ceiling opened to blow more cold air.

Envy screamed as it felt its body began to freeze and then crack and break as it moved and started to shapeshift defensively. Its clothing froze, cracked, broke and fell off. "You filthy honourless bastard!"

"You betrayed my trust!" said Armstrong as she leaped at the wall and slammed a switch with her hand, causing the heavy sliding bulkhead doors that would separate the halves of the room to start closing. She stared at Envy, not at all coolly since the freezing trick did not seem to be working on it as well as it had worked on Sloth, even despite the amount of liquid and cold air.

Since the streams of liquid and air came approximately from Armstrong's direction, Envy would risk its appendages if it tried to reach for her. Its next automatic response was to shapeshift towards its large true form, but even at this stressing moment it managed to remember that shapeshifting uncontrollably in a too small space next to dangerous machines was not a good idea. It grew only to fill the room as its regenerative powers fixed its broken body parts. For once there was some use in its large form since it kept the streams of cold air and liquid separate and thus the freezing effect was lessened.

Envy turned its head toward Armstrong and just barely saw her trying to hide behind the heavy sliding doors. It stretched its arm at her quickly but hesitated at grabbing her since its arm would get squished by the doors and it would lose the appendage. Armstrong had precious little space to dodge into, however, so even though Envy hesitated, it managed to slash rather deep into her thigh until it decided that it would rather save the rest of its arm because Armstrong had somehow managed to draw her sword and cut off three of Envy's large clawed fingers. At least the pain from the wound stunned her enough so that she did not manage to cut off the rest of Envy's arm right then. Only after Envy had started withdrawing its arm, it realised that it would have had time to kill her, and some lost arm would be a small enough price to pay for her death. Now it certainly would not have a chance of killing her, so it instead spewed an ultimatum at her. "I won't kill you if you let me get out of here!" it shouted at her at the last moment before the large sliding doors closed, just barely seeing her crawl toward the smaller door at the other end of the room.

Envy turned around and pressed its now rather large body against the streams of liquid and air to keep them from affecting anything more than a small part of its body. It had to escape. It knew that it was rather near to the outer wall of Fort Briggs, and in front of it there should only be a small corridor before the outer wall. It was a fortified wall and a fortified corridor, but Envy thought that it would be able to force its way through.

At that moment, Envy felt itself and the room start to get extremely cold, even without the interaction of the liquid and cold air. It screamed in agony as its body froze and crystallised. It kept on shapeshifting into anything, just to keep its body in some sort of motion. Of course, doing that shattered its frozen parts thoroughly.

Envy grew in size as it shapeshifted and managed to break and tear the walls next to it just enough to stop the annoying streams of air and liquid, and to its great relief, even the coldness that had been caused by Shrike's transmutation lessened considerably because Envy bent the ceiling and thus modified the transmutation circle that was hidden within it. Envy then tried to ram right through the back wall of the room. That turned out to be much harder than it had anticipated, but it managed to make the wall give in after a few attempts and some broken skin and bones and body parts that had shattered due to the cold. The instant it stuffed its body out of the room and into the corridor, it was shot.

From a tank.

With an explosive missile.

Since Envy was approximately the size of the corridor, there was no way it could evade and no way for the tank to miss. The force of the explosion tore its body apart and reduced it to literally nothing but its Philosopher's Stone. With the smoke and the few non-exploded remains of its body disintegrating all around the explosion site, the tank drivers apparently did not see what had happened because they fired another explosive right down the corridor.

The Philosopher's Stone that was Envy bounced back into the room where the freezing attempt had occurred. It started regenerating right away but could not scream because it had no organs for that yet. As soon as it was even vaguely aware of what kind of body parts it had, it made its best to concentrate, stop regenerating and instead just reform its body. It succeeded, but by then it was promptly shot from a small slit in the large closed sliding door – and of course this shot had to be explosive too. It blew away Envy's right arm and half of its upper torso.

At least the heat draining had stopped.

Envy wanted a way out, right away. The rapidly evaporating liquid still dribbled from the wall where Envy had smashed and torn it, so it dived straight into the hole and past the pipe that was spewing the liquid. It tore its body and almost lost its feet on the sharp and broken edges of the tear but managed to get in so that it was relatively safe, or at least out of anyone's sight. Grimacing in terrible pain, it reformed its body without fully regenerating again, shapeshifted immediately into a small and wiry humanoid-seeming animal and started off inside the wall and along the pipes. It passed a couple of surprised soldiers who were apparently operating the liquid pipe, but managed to escape them by fleeing deeper into the insides of the wall.

Envy ran for a long time, the first few moments nearly blinded by the awful pain it had just endured. At least its powers still worked and the pain stopped soon. It felt extremely off because of its very reduced mass and it had trouble controlling its body, also because of the odd form it had taken. Despite all the inconveniences, the small and light form was what it thought was best for moving inside the walls.

Envy soon started hearing instructions on the Fort's announcement system. "Code 5 and 14. There is a hostile enemy inside the Fort. The enemy is a shapeshifter and can therefore take the form of anything or anyone. All personnel are ordered to stay and move in groups of two or more at all times, no exceptions. Two minutes from now, everyone who is alone will be shot first and interrogated later. The enemy is most likely inside the walls of section E1. Second Lieutenant Schofield and team, report to Major Rodney in entrance E1-north-K1."

Even though it was still fleeing and should have been thinking about how to solve its situation, Envy could not help but think what had happened to its homunculus child. Even if Armstrong had seemed like she had been suspicious of Mustang's claims, Envy assumed that it was true that Mustang had found the child. But what had he done to it? Envy had instructed the child to stay away from humans and not kill them unless its own existence was in danger. Since the information about the child had made it to Armstrong, the child had either been captured or killed. Perhaps it was also possible that it had fled. Envy did not think that Mustang's people would have bothered to capture it, but after a while it remembered that humans had the tendency to be extremely wishy-washy. Even Mustang could be like that. Therefore, it had hope.

After a while, Envy noticed that the soldiers started opening parts of the wall. It wondered what was going on before it remembered that Briggs's wall sections were separate from each other. Envy could not get to every place in the Fort just by moving inside the walls. It would have to come out of the wall or go into the right pipe if it wanted to get out of the current section.

Now Envy understood why the announcement had told the soldiers to be in groups. Envy was a single creature, so even if it tried to shapeshift into a soldier, the others would harm it first, then discover it was the shapeshifter and then harm it more. It cursed whoever had come up with such a stupidly simple way of making its ability to masquerade as a soldier useless.

Envy considered going into the ventilation shafts. Its biggest problem would be navigating in the piping. Inside the wall, there were just enough cracks to let a barely sufficient amount of light in, and now that the soldiers were opening the wall panels, even more light came in. In the piping, there would be no light at all, and even enhanced vision would not work without any light. In addition, even if Envy could see inside the pipes, there was no way for it to know where it was exactly. Even Shrike could not remember the pipes' routes by heart, and Envy much less so since it was not really interested in ventilation like Shrike was. It also had no idea where each pipe went. The pipe route maps were really hard to get to see at all because they were a considerable security risk.

Its next idea was even worse. It decided right away that it would not seek out a toilet and flush itself into the plumbing. That would be disgusting and it had no idea what waited it at the end of the plumbing.

Envy also discarded its idea of just attacking the soldiers and killing them until it had carved a way out through their corpses. It could feel that its Philosopher's Stone did not have all that much energy and it had no idea how many times it could die before running out. It was still many, but if the soldiers were shooting at it with tanks and explosive bullets, even many would probably not be enough.

It sat down inside the wall and pondered its options. After a while, it noticed that the soldiers were taking more of the walls down. It needed to do something quickly. Finally, Envy got a usable idea: while it was hard to know where a ventilation pipe exited, it was obvious where it came from. At the beginning of each pipe was a ventilation machine, and Envy knew where the main machine for this section was. It was somewhat stunned that its work on things related to ventilation had proved to be useful.

Envy opened the valves of one section of a ventilation pipe and slid its body inside the pipe. It could not close the valves, but it manoeuvred the pipe back in place so that people would have to at least try to open the valves to find out that the pipe had been opened but not closed – as long as the pipe did not dislocate by itself. The inside of the pipe was dark, but there were no notable obstructions in it and the only thing Envy had to do was follow where the air was coming from. It changed into a snake and slithered away, breaking all the filters it came across. At least moving as a snake was similar regardless of how little it now weighed.

It did not take long for the pipe to merge into a larger ventilation shaft. After that, Envy soon came to the large ventilation machine. Some faint light emanated from the machine and Envy could see again. The air flow was not so powerful that it would have particularly hindered Envy. Envy could see the fan blades rotating at a high speed and it wondered how it would get out. It could of course grow again and burst out of the pipe, but that would create a lot of noise and it did not want to be noticed if it could avoid that.

After observing the fan blades for a moment, it recalled that the filter in front of the fan was also replaceable; it could break the filter and then slide a part of itself into the ventilation machine and outside of it into the room to see whether the coast was clear. It transformed so that it had a sharp blade for a hand and broke the filter, cutting a piece out of it. Having done that, it started extending a finger-like appendage with an eye on its end into the machine. It soon found a grate through which it saw into the room.

The room was not unfamiliar to Envy since it had been there before. The ventilation machine and three others like it were in a hall right next to each other. It saw only two people in the room: Shrike's acquaintance Mil and another member of the ventilation team whose name it did not remember. They would be easy to take down.

Envy withdrew its appendage and decided to cut through the pipe on the side of the wall so that the two men could not see it. The machines made so much noise that they would drown out the sound of the cutting if Envy was careful. It transformed an appendage into a blade again and started sawing. Since it could not get much leverage in the small shaft and in its small form, it took a while until it managed to cut a large enough hole to squeeze through.

Envy was still the wrong size and it was not entirely sure if it could shapeshift quickly enough to take the men by surprise. The form was easy to change, but it also needed more mass, and changing that was not quick. It settled for increasing its mass as much as it could without growing too large for its hiding place.

Envy jumped at Mil and his partner and succeeded in taking the two men by surprise. Mil managed to hit Envy with his fist, but Envy was not damaged by it. Envy, then again, smashed their faces right in. Then it realised that it could have knocked out just one of them, shapeshifted into the fallen one and forced the other one to walk with it so that the soldiers would not shoot it because it was alone.

Then Envy thought that they probably would not have cooperated even if it would have threatened to kill them. Briggs soldiers and their loyalty! Envy could not deny that while it had been one of them, it had sort of liked the trust they had in it, even if it did not exactly return that. Now it was them against it and it hated that.

Envy made a few angry faces and pondered what to do next. Since this ventilation centre was a circulator for clean indoor air, it was not right next to the outer wall, but it was somewhat close. Envy tried to recall the route to the closest loading area and thought that it remembered the way well enough.

Then it only had to get there.

Envy again considered just running through the corridors and taking any damage the soldiers threw at it, but the route was still long and the thought of getting blown up was repulsive. It tried to come up with alternative ideas, and after looking at the soldiers' bodies, it thought of one. It could not sneak out alone, but it could hide one of them and pretend to be trashed out along with the other one. That ought to make the other soldiers think it was who it presented as.

Since it knew Mil's name and how he sounded and had even talked to him before at some point, it hid his body in a closet and grabbed the other one. Having done that, it checked that the door to the room was closed but not locked or fortified. Then it transformed one of its arms much larger, ready to thrash two of the ventilation machines.

Envy crushed the machines, transformed its arm back and jumped right through the door, holding the body of Mil's friend.

"Aaah!" it shouted in act as it crashed in to the wall beyond the door. It glanced into the direction where it was supposed to go and saw a trio of soldiers taking aim at them. They were startled at the sound of breaking machinery. "Aagh! It's in there!" it shouted and started stumbling upright and pulling the other soldier's body with it. By now it knew that Briggs soldiers tried to save each other unless it was utterly hopeless. It made its way toward the trio who came at it and were now pointing their weapons past it. Two other soldiers came around the corner, ready with their weapons. One of them shouted down the corridor that they had found the enemy, and Envy heard some acknowledgements.

"What happened to him?" asked the other of the two soldiers.

"It... something broke the ventilation machines and him hit and made us crash through the door. It hit him in the... he's... is he..." Envy mumbled like a stupid human and checked that the soldier it was holding had a bleeding but not serious would on his head and he was unconscious. "I should take him to the medical room. Would... can you come with me?" it asked from the two other soldiers.

At that moment, even more soldiers came in, among them First Lieutenant Massena and Shrike. Shrike looked incredibly serious.

"I'll go," said one of the two soldiers. He handed his gun to Envy and picked up the unconscious soldier. He and Envy started heading down the corridor and passed the other soldiers, Shrike among them. Envy could not help giving Shrike a mean glare.

Shrike continued on his way, but stopped after a moment as Massena started issuing commands to the soldiers. He frowned deeply and looked after Envy and the other soldier as they disappeared behind a corner. He looked back at Massena and then at the empty corner.

"Uh... sir..."

"What, Shrike?"

"I um... I think that Mil... the soldier who just left... that he was Envy?"

"What?"

"I think Mil was Envy."

"What do you mean?

"Um..." Shrike had no idea why Massena was not getting what he was saying. "I'm sorry, sir... Ah, wait! I uh, I forgot... Um, the shapeshifter we're looking for is Envy. Envy is the shapeshifter."

"WHAT?"

"Uh... uh... I mean... I think Mil was the shapeshifter."

"And Mil was...?"

"The soldier who just left, sir."

"..." Massena was speechless. "You! Is the room empty? Check it!" she shouted at the trio of soldiers.

They advanced carefully and took a quick look into the room and then a longer one. "Seems so!" shouted one of them.

"Check it thoroughly!" Massena turned at her troupe. "Shrike, you four, with me. The rest, help them." Having said that, she started running after Envy, the soldiers following her. "Shrike, explain this to me better now! What are we doing?" she barked, obviously frustrated.

"S-sorry – –"

"Stop apologising and answer me!"

The words caught in Shrike's throat. "U-uh... The soldier, Mil... the one with long hair... was the shapeshifter."

"How do you know that?"

"...I-I know Mil, and I thought he acted oddly."

"Okay. Are you sure about that?"

"Fairly..."

"I didn't want to hear that. Okay, when you see him, don't shoot to kill."

Shrike's stomach stung and he felt hopeless.

Envy came to a fork in the corridor where they would have to go on a different route if they were going to go to the medical room. Luckily the soldier who was carrying the unconscious one was of lower rank than Mil, so Envy just issued commands.

"Where are you going? Follow me!"

"But... sir, the lift is that way."

"No it isn't. Are you new here? Come on." Envy smirked widely as the soldier obeyed it and followed. They ran past two small groups of soldiers. They both asked where they were going, and the first group accepted their destination without argument, but the second one, which was close to the loading area, noticed that something was off.

"The lift is that way!" said the highest ranking officer, a sergeant, to Envy.

"No, it isn't, sir. It's right behind here."

"I tried to tell that t– –" started the private who was carrying Mil's partner's body.

"That way is the loading area."

"No... Really? It is? Oh... darn it," mumbled Envy. "I... I really thought it was here. I must have a concussion. I-I feel dizzy." Envy started staggering toward the door to the observation room of the loading area.

"Hm." The sergeant frowned. He looked at one of his soldiers. "Okay, go with the private to take the injured one to the medical room." He turned to another soldier. "You, go check whether he's okay and try to get him into the medical room as well."

"Yes, sir." The second private went after Envy. "Sir, are you okay?"

"I... I think I just need to sit down for a moment." It opened the door to the loading area observation room and went in, the private following it.

There were two soldiers in the observation room. They looked inquiringly at Envy and the private when they came in.

"What are you doing here?" asked one of them.

"I'm dizzy, I think I have a concussion," said Envy and closed the door.

"You should head to the medical room."

"Yeah... Yeah, I guess, but I don't think I should walk right now, so unless you'd like to carry me, I think I'll just sit here for a moment."

"Okay. Well, I can phone for someone to bring a stretcher, they can take you."

Envy definitely did not want the soldier to phone anyone. At least the previous group seemed like it was not following Envy past putting the one private to look after it. Therefore, Envy attacked both the soldier who was about to make the call and the private standing by the door and knocked them down forcefully. Both of them were either knocked unconscious with the one blow or killed straight, and Envy turned to the third person who was sitting at the control panel and now looked very confusedly at Envy. While he was taken by surprise, he managed to pull out his pistol and shoot at Envy. He hit it in the shoulder, and then Envy promptly smacked him senseless as well.

Envy thought that the gunshot must have been heard outside as well, so it shapeshifted its body larger to block the door that it hoped was fortified in case the soldiers tried to shoot through it. It then went to look at the control panel and quickly found the emergency door opening mechanism. It knew the doors would open quickly, so it instead started securing a clear way to the exit. It would somehow need to go through the glass window of the observation room, and of course the glass was fortified. Still, Envy had no choice but to try, so it grabbed the portable machine gun that the first soldier in the observation room had had and started shooting at the window. The bullets made cracks and dents, but the glass did not break and the bullets did not go through. Envy made a rough circle with its firing before the ammo ran out. After that, it grabbed a heavy semi-automatic rifle sitting in the corner of the observation room and shot at the glass again. The rifle managed to actually make a hole in the now weakened glass, but the window did not shatter. Envy fired five more rounds until the rifle was out of ammo as well.

The window still was not broken.

Envy could see soldiers in the loading area. They had noticed its doings a while ago and taken firing positions and one was calling for backup. Furious, Envy grabbed a chair and threw it at the window. The chair broke into splinters. After two more seconds of thinking, Envy pushed the fallen soldiers out of the way and picked up a piece of control machinery, tearing it right out of its place. It weighed quite a lot and Envy was not in an ideal shape, position or weight to handle it. Despite the troubles Envy had with handling the machine, it managed to hurl the machine at the window, and this time the window cracked noticeably, though it still did not break.

Envy had had it with the window. It slammed the emergency door opening button and quickly shapeshifted into a monstrous amalgam of a shark-like creature with a very sharp and hard head and a rabbit and charged right at the window. It managed to get enough momentum behind its leap so that the window finally broke. Of course, it was immediately shot at by the soldiers in the loading area. Luckily for it, most of the shots missed as it shapeshifted back into human form as it fell. When it landed, it dropped partially on a truck's roof, breaking some of the rack structures, and then slid down the truck's side so that it was flanked by two trucks. It heard the door still opening and since it was so close to its goal now, it decided to just rush through.

Envy darted toward the doors. It was immediately shot again, but it moved quickly and shapeshifted and regenerated erratically, which also helped it avoid some shots. The doors started closing again when Envy was very close to it, but by then it was too late. Envy managed to get outside into the snow. Once there, it noticed that the weather was very cold – the temperature in the mountains was consistently below -40°C in winter if the sun was not shining. In addition, there seemed to be at least a small snowstorm going on. It immediately shapeshifted into a furry horse and ran off as fast as it could.

Just then Envy heard a weapon launching something, and the sound was very worrisome. It turned its head to see that something relatively big was coming right at it at high speed. It could alter its movement a little and tried to jump out of the way, but it was still caught in the large explosion from the bazooka's missile.

The force of the explosion obliterated its body.


	10. Present

**Author's note:** This isn't a very plot-heavy chapter, so if you're not all that interested in what Shrike does and thinks, skip to chapter 11. Or the last section of chapter 11. Or even straight to 12.

* * *

Shrike ran into the loading area after Massena and just barely saw how Envy ran toward the doors while the other soldiers shot at it. He saw how it regenerated and shapeshifted, seemingly randomly. The visage made him nauseous. While it was less shocking to not see anywhere any entrails or blood left behind from Envy's hurt body, that added to the vague feeling of utter unnaturality. Did the Philosopher's Stone really give Envy that kind of horrible power?

Once Envy made it outside, Shrike saw it shapeshifting into a horse and starting to run away. As he watched it get completely blown up by the bazooka explosive, his jaw dropped and tears flowed right down his face. He felt surreal and shocked. He coughed forcefully to hide his reaction but shook terribly nonetheless. He did not quite know why he felt so awful. Maybe he had loved Envy in some odd way, but surely he should not be feeling like this?

Massena started ordering her soldiers around, telling them to gear up and go check the explosion site outside to make sure the enemy was not there and to look for any remains. She called Shrike by name several times, but when Shrike did not respond, she had to give orders to the rest of the soldiers first.

Shrike had not truly believed that the Philosopher's Stone gave Envy so much power, even after both Envy and Armstrong had explained the issue to him. The Philosopher's Stone was supposed to be a fairy tale. Envy could shapeshift, sure, but Shrike had nearly always seen it in a human form, which should mean that it was human in some way. But the regenerating and getting blown up into nothing was unnatural. It was so unnatural that Shrike could not get over it now.

When Massena was done, she walked to Shrike with some other soldier in tow, looking anrgy. "Warrant Officer Kaine Shrike, what the HELL do you think you're doing? We have a situation here and you're doing what?" she shouted.

Shrike startled and turned his teary face at Massena. "W-what? Sir?"

"Are you crying?" she asked in an incredulous tone.

"Sir, what? The situation is over!"

"...Can you fix the window of the observation room with your alchemy?"

Shrike looked at the broken window. "Y-yes, sir, I think so."

"Do that and then help with fixing the machine that thing tore off in there."

"Yes, sir." Shrike turned and started walking briskly. Massena told the other soldier, Lance Corporal Tirpitz, to go with him. Shrike almost wiped his face on his sleeve until he remembered that he was wearing the sooty coat he used while doing ventilation maintenance. He then dug a handkerchief out of his pocket and wiped his face with that. Of course, that did not stop the tears from coming.

When Shrike arrived at the observation room, the three soldiers Envy had knocked out had been taken away, and two engineers had just arrived. They were looking at the broken piece of machinery and talking about it. One more soldier was standing in the room, holding a gun and looking alert. Shrike looked at the window and realised that a large part of it was missing and most of the shards were not in the room.

Shrike turned around and headed back to the loading area.

"Hey... Hey, sir!" shouted Tirpitz and followed him. "Warrant Officer Shrike! Where are you going?"

"I-I need the shards..."

"Shards?"

"For the window."

"Why?"

Shrike stopped walking. "Uh...? What?"

"Why do you need the shards for the window, sir? Can't you just do that alchemy thing and make it whole again?"

"It... it... I don't... I need the shards." Shrike started walking again.

Tirpitz was puzzled and had no idea what was going on, but since Shrike was a senior officer, he did not push his questions further.

When Shrike got back to the loading area, he started gathering the glass pieces. Most of them were in relatively large chunks since the fortified glass did not shatter into tiny sharp pieces like normal glass. Tirpitz helped him.

When they were done collecting the pieces, they returned to the observation room.

"D-do you have any more glass shards?" asked Shrike from the two engineers.

The engineers were now sitting on the floor and looking at the wiring of the machine. They turned to look at Shrike and seemed a little confused, and not just because of the question but because Shrike looked like he had wept. "Why do you need those?" asked the other one.

Shrike did not reply but went to collect the few pieces he saw in a corner and then cleaned another corner as well. He placed all the shards on a table and then dug out a small notebook and a pen from his pocket. He spent a while looking agonised over having to draw a transmutation circle.

"I can't do this!" he whined.

"You can't do what?" asked the soldier who was standing guard.

"Fix the window..."

The guard came to look at what Shrike had drawn. "With alchemy? How so? Isn't that easy, you just kind of shape the shards back into a window shape?"

"...Oh, that's why you needed the shards!" commented Tirpitz.

"But this is... this is fortified glass, I'm not sure about the structure. I can't make it like it was..."

"Hm. Well, I guess it's enough if you just make it whole for now. It can be replaced with a suitable one later," continued the guard.

"Uh..." Shrike turned back at his notebook and spent another moment drawing the appropriate circle. Once he was once, he took the shards and placed them in a pile on the paper with the circle and held the paper right next to the window. His hands shook and nothing happened.

"Sir?" asked Tirpitz after a while. The guard gave Tirpitz an odd look because he could not understand why Tirpitz called Shrike sir.

When Shrike did not reply and still did not do anything, also the guard spoke. "Is something wrong?"

Shrike took a moment to reply. "No... I just need to concentrate but..."

"What's so hard about that? You have the circle already, don't you just need to activate it?"

"But I still have to concentrate on what I'm doing..."

"Just do it, surely you can!"

One of the engineers saw how Shrike shivered considerably at the guard's words and spoke up. "Hey, take your time, as much as you need. Rushing alchemy isn't a good idea, right?" He then turned at the guard and held a finger to his lips to keep the guard from speaking. The guard was quite puzzled but kept quiet nevertheless. Shrike lowered the shards and the piece of paper and a few tears fell down his face.

Shrike took another minute but then he finally lifted the shards and the paper again and transmuted the window. The window and the shards glowed and reformed and the window became whole again. The result, while it was readily recognisable as a window, was obviously not quite what it should be. Shrike was not happy at all. "That... that isn't good... It should be replaced right away..."

"But it looks fine. Maybe it isn't like it should be but it is a clear enough window," said the guard.

"But its structural integrity is bad," mumbled Shrike.

"Come on, leave it," said the engineer. "If it isn't going to break down on our necks when someone accidentally touches it, it's good enough for now."

"Uh." Shrike stood still for a moment and then walked to the two engineers. "U-um... Do you need help with that?"

"Hm, well, if you can fix the broken casing with alchemy, that would be a good start because otherwise we need to take this whole thing apart."

"I guess I can do that..." Shrike took out a pre-drawn circle and though he had to spend a moment to concentrate again, he managed to transmute the outer shell of the machine as it had been.

Shrike also fixed the torn wires and a few broken components, but there were several parts that were just too complicated to repair for someone who had not studied electrical engineering past the very basics. Even though he was not expected to know everything or fix everything, Shrike was very apprehensive about not being able to help them as well as he would have liked. He was already crying and having trouble concentrating, so he thought he really did not need to add incompetence to the mix. Still, he did not try to pretend to be able to repair the complex parts. He just apologised and left the room, with Tirpitz following.

Shrike slowly made his way to the sector's ventilation centre where Envy had thrashed two of the four machines. Three engineers and two ventilation maintainers were already in the room, discussing what they should do first. Shrike did not want to get involved but instead looked for a sweeping brush and slowly collected all the loose material into one pile. Having done that, he spent a while sorting the pieces into separate piles according to what material they were made of. Finally, he transmuted each pile into a uniform mass for easier transport. That was when the other ventilation maintainers and engineers noticed him.

"Hey, Shrike?" asked one of the ventilation maintainers curiously. "What are you doing?"

"Um, I just collected all the pieces so we can reuse them..."

"Reuse...? Oh, you can fix the machines by using that stuff?"

"Not really... I mean, I can help with it a little but I really don't think I can completely fix them..."

Shrike then fixed first the outer casing and other small but simple parts of the machines. Once he started working on the more complex parts inside the machines, more problems came up. After a few transmutations, he started having problems concentrating again. He could no longer block Envy's fate from his mind and tears fell down his face once more.

He coughed and started talking about something else. "I-I wish this didn't look so easy..."

"What, the transmuting that you do?" asked the engineer he was working with. "Why, isn't it easy?"

"Not at all! There's a reason why only very few people become alchemists," whined Shrike.

The engineer looked at him a little oddly, not liking what he understood to be an indirect implication that Shrike was better just because he could perform alchemy. The engineer searched for and pulled out a component that had been misshapen. "Can you fix this?" He dug out another identical but unbroken component. "This is how it should look like. These connections are half a millimetre deep, this part is aluminium and this is silicon."

"Um..." Shrike studied the pieces for a moment and then placed the broken one on the transmutation circle he had been using to repair the parts. He held his hand above the circle but did not yet transmute.

"Well?" said the engineer after a while.

"Um... wait."

"...How long?"

Shrike did not reply. The tears fell from his face on the floor.

The engineer looked somewhat inconvenienced. He dug a tissue from his pocket and gave it to Shrike. Shrike wiped his face. "Hey, why is it that you're crying? Is this alchemy stuff really so hard?" he asked with a quieter tone.

"Er, no, it's... it isn't because of that."

"Why then?"

"I don't... I don't want to explain right now." He put the tissue away. "I don't even know if I could..."

The engineer looked a little confused. "Huh?"

"It's, uh... never mind." Shrike resumed staring at the broken component. After another long moment, he finally touched the circle and transmuted the piece. Once he was done, he frowned. "I... can you test that before you use it?"

"Well, yeah. But – –"

"I think I made a mistake with it, but..."

"It looks fine to me."

"It would be a structural flaw that one couldn't see."

"Why can't you try again then?"

"I, I'm not sure if I made a mistake... And I just can't focus any longer, this is awful..." Shrike dug out a watch from his pocket and noted that his actual working shift was over. "Um, my shift is over. I-I'm really sorry I couldn't..."

"Nah, that's okay, at least you fixed those parts this far, you know. So thanks."

"Uh." Shrike got up and left the room. Tirpitz followed him. Shrike felt worse and worse and stopped walking soon. He leaned on a wall, shivered and then slid down next to a box. He took out his handkerchief, hugged his knees to him and hid his face.

"Sir?" asked Tirpitz. "...Are you okay? ...Are you hurt?"

Shrike shook his head.

Tirpitz had no clue what was going on, so he had to settle for just standing next to Shrike.

A patrol passed them a minute later but did not bother them. Two minutes after that, Massena and two soldiers from her unit walked by.

"Tirpitz? What are you doing standing there?" asked Massena.

"I'm just watching over Warrant Officer Shrike, First Lieutenant."

Massena looked inquiring but followed Tirpitz's line of sight to the huddling Shrike. "Shrike? Are you hurt?"

Shrike shook his head again.

"What are you doing then?" When she got no reply, she started issuing commands. "Get up."

Shrike stood up rather restrainedly and looked at Massena.

Massena looked back at him and seemed confused. "You're still crying? Really? What for?"

Shrike turned his face away. "I guess... Maybe... because I lost..."

"You lost what? Stop mumbling!" She looked intently at Shrike, but he would not look back. "Oh, now I get it! Before we killed that shapeshifter, you tried to say that Envy was the shapeshifter! It didn't make sense to me before. But you were very close to her, and we just blew her into thin air, so you're feeling... what, emotional loss?" Her tone changed into a very condescending one and she even seemed slightly disgusted toward the end. "Seriously, Shrike? You saw that your girlfriend being something that isn't even HUMAN and you're still incredibly upset about her getting blown up?"

"Sir, maybe it's because of that exactly," said one of the soldiers who had been walking with Massena. "I mean, because it shocked him to learn that his girlfriend wasn't human."

"Envy wasn't a woman! Seriously!" said the other soldier.

"Shut up," said Massena to the other soldier. "Hmh. Well, whatever the case, that shapeshifter was completely destroyed and there's nothing to be done about it. Get a grip, Shrike. If this were an actual war or fight, you'd be hopelessly dead."

Shrike turned to stare at his commanding officer. "How do I turn this off, then?!" he exclaimed, breaking his voice at the end.

"By forcing it! I'm not saying it's easy or that it should be easy, but you need to do it. Preferably right now!" she said sternly.

Shrike stared at her. "I-I'm not even on duty..."

Massena gave Shrike a very odd, pondering look. "I can't believe this!" she barked. "What kind of sissy are you? You're short, weak, effeminate, suck at close combat and now this. My ten-year-old little sister handled it better when our mother was killed several years ago! You're crying over a GIRLFRIEND who was a MONSTER."

Now Shrike could not believe what he was hearing. He felt like throwing up and his chest hurt considerably just from the insults that he felt were utterly and objectively unjustified and useless. What Massena had said was entirely out of line, unnecessary and unfair, and most of all, she was being a gigantic jerk. He considered throwing himself on the ground like an animal that wanted to die and see whether Massena would kick him. He could not bear to look at her face, so he stared intently at her collar. It did not help his image with Massena, but it was all he could do at the moment.

"You're disgusting, sir," he whispered.

Massena had tried to provoke Shrike into revealing his true disposition; she had expected Shrike to try to prove his manliness by trying to hit her or seal his uselessness by crying his eyes off. She had not expected something quite like this and did not speak.

Shrike continued with his idea now that he had managed to say it. "That was completely out of line, sir. You made me physically ill, so I request permission to go to the medical room, sir," he continued whispering.

Massena stared at Shrike angrily. "FINE. Go with him," she said to Tirpitz. She walked away with the two other soldiers.

Shrike leaned on the wall and tried to keep his stomach and its contents from crawling up his throat. Some more tears fell down his face. Tirpitz just looked at him and said nothing. When Shrike felt well enough to walk, he headed for a lift and Tirpitz followed him.

Once they had gotten into the lift, Tirpitz started talking. "Er, sir, don't you think you're overreacting a bit?"

"...Please just shut up," whispered Shrike. "I don't know what the hell is wrong with me but telling me that DOES NOT help. Once I understand it myself, I can do something about it, but not before." He paused. "And it was SHE who was overreacting, that was so contemptuous."

Tirpitz stayed quiet and thought about Shrike's words. Shrike just sniffled and avoided looking at anyone.

They made it to the medical room, and the doors to the recovery room were also open. Altogether four soldiers were standing guard in the two rooms. Besides one bad case of flu and one close combat training accident, there were only the five patients who Envy had hit. Two of them, Mil and his partner, were currently lying on their beds unattended and seemed to be mostly okay. One was lying peacefully on his bed and seemed to have some non-serious injuries; he had been patched up temporarily. One soldier was fussing over the head trauma on one of the people who Envy had taken down in the observation room of the loading area. Since the doctor and two more soldiers were with the last patient in the medical room, talking heatedly about something, Shrike did not go there to disturb them. He was not interested in listening to them either.

Shrike looked at Mil questioningly, but his nausea started getting the best of him. "Okay, Tirpitz, you can go. I'll stay here but first I'm just going to go over there and throw up," he said monotonously and not really paying attention to anyone.

"...Yes, sir," said Tirpitz and left with one of the guarding soldiers.

Shrike walked into the toilet and did just what he had set out do to. He then spent a moment cleaning up his face and returned to the recovery room. He went to an empty bed next to Mil and lay down.

"Are you okay, sir?" asked one of the guards.

"Uh... I'm not bleeding or otherwise injured like that," replied Shrike without looking at the guard.

Now that he had nothing to do, Shrike had to go through all the thoughts and questions while he lay on the bed. His first concern was for Envy: was it really dead like Massena had claimed? It could obviously regenerate like it had said, but surely no one could survive getting blown up. Or did the Philosopher's Stone somehow really save it from that as well? And what in the world had it done to get Armstrong to try to kill it? Shrike had difficulty imagining that the fact that it had been able to perform alchemy would be enough of a reason to kill it. And why was creating one homunculus so horrible? He could not come to any reasonable conclusions with his lacking knowledge, so he eventually just made himself accept what had happened. Envy had done something that was so wrong that Armstrong had decided to get rid of it. It had been shot at and blown up and could be dead. He was feeling very upset about that.

As Shrike thought of what had apparently happened to Envy, it finally dawned on him that HE must have tried to kill Envy when he had attempted to freeze the room that was next to the air intake room. Even though Shrike had at no point gotten a clear clue about it, Envy must have been in that room, because why else would Armstrong have asked him to freeze it? His shock just grew. He had not even thought about what he had been doing, he had just done what Armstrong commanded. Armstrong had been very disappointed at him because he had not shared that Envy could perform alchemy, and he had been so upset that he had practically jumped at the opportunity to prove that he could be useful by doing whatever she asked without question. He could not even imagine how he would have felt if he had managed to kill Envy himself. Even now, he felt like panicking, but everything was over and there was nothing he could do.

Shrike did not want Envy to be dead – despite its usually unfriendly way of treating him, it had still accepted him and he thought that Envy would have called him its friend too. They had been otherwise close as well. Even though Envy was intimidating and had nearly assaulted Shrike a few times, he had felt mostly safe with it around, since it kept other people away. That realisation felt odd to even Shrike himself, but the issue did not make him feel bad so he did not think more of it now.

After mulling on his thoughts and shedding some more tears, he came to the conclusion that apparently he had loved Envy and was feeling so bad because it would not be a part of his life from now on. Figuring that out did not make him feel better, which irked him, but at least he started feeling like he was not incapacitated any longer.


	11. Expectations

Armstrong, Rodney and Massena were inspecting the damage in the room where they had tried to freeze Envy. The explosives from the tank had caused more damage than anything Envy had done. A team of plumbers had arrived to replace the damaged piping and take out some of the extra modifications they had done in order to attempt the freezing.

"What is the situation with the water pipes?" asked Armstrong. She was sitting on the floor and spoke with some strain because the large wound in her thigh was rather painful. The wound had been tied up temporarily; since the doctor had patients with worse injuries, Armstrong had not even considered staying in the medical room. In addition, she had wanted to see what Envy had done to her Fort.

"That thing only broke the ones here and a few there, and they are a little bent along the way. The plumbers just told me that they'll replace first the broken and obviously bent ones, but they'll try to manipulate the less bent ones back into shape," replied Massena.

"And the ventilation shafts?"

"They seem to be more torn here, but I think they're repairable too, sir. Most of the ventilation people are in the ventilation centre of this section since that thing trashed two of the machines there."

"How did it get there in the first place?"

"I heard someone say that it must have moved through the ventilation shafts. In the ventilation centre, there was some kind of hole in one of the shafts that didn't look like it had been done violently, but rather by cutting."

"How the hell did it even fit there?"

"Well, I guess it just changed its shape, sir."

"Yes, but it shouldn't be able to become that small!"

Massena could not reply anything to that, so she stayed quiet.

"Where is Shrike?" asked Armstrong after a moment. "Is he also working in the ventilation centre? He should come here to both fix these ventilation shafts and remove the modification he made to the structures. I suspect he could also use his alchemy to utilise the rubble so that we don't have to use so many new parts to rebuild all this."

Massena sighed. "He was in there but left some time ago. Then he had some kind of emotional collapse due to seeing that monster get blown up. He should be in the medical room now, sir."

"What?" asked Armstrong in an incredulous tone.

"Apparently that shapeshifter was Envy, and Shrike was together with her, and he's upset because of that. Even if this was a rather extraordinary circumstance, I have never seen such unprofessional conduct from an officer."

"I can't believe how unsurprised I am to hear this."

"I'll probably demote him once I get back to my papers," said Massena, mostly to herself.

"Wait until he seems stable enough and ask him to explain himself first," commented Armstrong.

"Hmh. Yes, sir." She was quiet for a moment. "Sometimes I do wonder why you chose to hire him. He just isn't fit to be a soldier."

"He's trustworthy and good enough at his job, like everyone else."

"But then why promote him at all, sir? He could take care of the ventilation machinery while being a private. Or even a civilian."

"This far he's earned his promotions and I saw no reason not to promote him even despite his character. "

"But what good is it having such a... well, milksop, excuse my vocabulary, have a high rank?"

"The added responsibility of having a higher rank makes him want to improve more. As I've recently discovered, I know he hates fighting but he has a willingness to solve problems without violence or war. The rest of us know how to war, so I'm hoping he will grow strong enough to tell us when not to war. I only resent the fact that he's so slow at it."

"I fear you'll have to wait too long, sir," said Massena. "I'm not going to be extra lenient with him just because he isn't a good soldier."

"Nor should you. What do you think about using alchemy in the Fort?"

"I don't like alchemy. It creates more problems than it solves, and the whole practice creates too power-hungry people who don't care for others."

"Would you describe Shrike as too power-hungry?"

Massena scoffed. "No, sir. I have to admit that he's one person for whom alchemy actually fits. It lets him cheat his way out of proper practice and work but lets him do something that he's even marginally good at. It might end up being his metier. His personality is suitable for alchemy since he's realistic and altruistic enough to not use it for things other than the common good and he won't be reckless with it."

"Good."

Now that she had seen most of the damages, Armstrong finally decided to go to the medical room to have the doctor take care of her thigh. She got up and Rodney helped her to get there.

First, Armstrong went into the recovery room to talk to Shrike. Shrike was lying on a bed and looked beaten and not entirely focused.

"Shrike, attention."

Shrike startled and sat up suddenly. He saluted Armstrong without getting up and wondered where her wound had come from, but it was not his place to ask any questions about that.

"Go to the room where you attempted freezing Envy and remove the modifications. Help the others fix the structures. Then come back here."

Shrike almost said that his shift was already over, but stopped himself. "Yes, sir," he replied tiredly, got up and left.

Shrike retrieved his tools, went to the room and got to work. Even though he was not as efficient as he could have been, focusing on something else again made him feel a little better. He removed all the modifications he had made in order to attempt freezing Envy, managed to fix some of the panelling with alchemy and reused the rubble to make replacement parts. He got the structures in proper working order and told the next team to start working in the next room.

After that, he took his tools back to the maintenance office of mandatory machinery and returned to the medical room. Armstrong's leg had not been stitched yet, so he went to get something to eat. He took his time, and when he was done, Armstrong's operation was finished.

Armstrong was on a bed in the recovery room. She, Rodney and Shrike got into a nearby room to talk privately.

"So, do you have anything to add now that we've exposed Envy's betrayal and it's no longer a threat?"

"Threat? Uh, no, sir. I... I don't even understand any of this... Why did you have it killed?"

Armstrong started paraphrasing the reasons she had heard from Mustang over the telephone earlier that day. "It learned alchemy and created another homunculus. The threat in that is that if it knows alchemy, it can create Philosopher's Stones on its own. As I told you, Philosopher's Stones are made of living people, and Envy would definitely kill people to create more Stones. Even if it promised to not make Philosopher's Stones, that is too great a risk. And if it can create one homunculus, it can create an indefinite number of them, and so we would soon have an army of homunculi in our hands. I do not want to one day wake up to a horde of homunculi slaughtering us by the millions, and I'm pretty certain you and everyone else do not either. On top of all this, Envy kept everything secret, lied to me and even got you to withhold information from me! I do not tolerate that kind of activities."

Mustang had indeed claimed that Envy had created the homunculus, but Armstrong had considered the statement utterly ridiculous. She had not believed it until Shrike had confirmed that Envy could perform alchemy. She also had not been and still was not as adamant as Mustang about the reasoning behind Envy being dangerous. Nonetheless, Mustang's alleged findings had been enough to investigate, and once they had been confirmed true, she had had no choice but to do what Mustang had required and try to kill Envy.

Shrike looked concerned and scared. "How could it have created more Philosopher's Stones or those homunculi, sir? It just lost its ability to perform alchemy..."

"What?"

"Uh... Well, I knew it could do alchemy, but it lost that ability a bit over a month ago."

"What? Are you sure it didn't just lie to you?"

"I-I don't see why it would have lied, sir... Envy wasn't exactly happy about it and tried to hide it. It didn't tell me about that until I asked it to do alchemy and it couldn't come up with an excuse why it wouldn't want to do it."

"Why did it assumedly lose its alchemy?"

"It didn't know, but it said that it had to cut a part of its body off because it got squished under a rock and that that was the only thing it could think of that could have caused it."

Armstrong could well believe that Shrike believed Envy's words, but she did not believe that Envy would have suddenly become unable to perform alchemy. "Hmph. How long have you known that Envy could do alchemy?"

"Um... It told me about it in March, sir."

"March? LAST MARCH? How could it keep it a secret?! Why didn't you say anything to me?!"

Shrike was frightened. "U-uh, so-sorry, sir... I didn't know it was that important. I-I'm sorry, sir."

"How could you NOT know it was important? You're an alchemist yourself! You KNOW how dangerous alchemy can be!"

Shrike was quiet for a moment before he could speak again. "Envy was dangerous by itself, and so is anyone with a tank, sir..."

Armstrong stared at Shrike but had to admit that he had a point. "Alchemy is dangerous in a different way. As I said, it can create more Philosopher's Stones and homunculi now."

"S-sir... Why do you think Envy would have created an army or made Philosopher's Stones?"

Armstrong considered just sending Shrike away since he was being naïve and was not in a position to question her, but she figured that it was probably better to explain things to him so that he would understand what was going on – otherwise he would likely dwell on it too long just by himself or even feel too sympathetic toward Envy. "It would create Philosopher's Stones to extend its life and abilities, though I suspect that for Envy the best part of the Philosopher's Stone is that creating one kills humans. In addition, a Philosopher's Stone vastly increases an alchemist's abilities, surely you know of that. Even you might be able to freeze the entire Fort if you had one. As for an army, it would want to supplant and enslave humans because it hated us. This is obvious."

Shrike frowned. "But why... why did you even bring it here then, sir?"

"Because I thought it was unable to perform alchemy and because its abilities would have been very useful."

"Wh-what if it only made another homunculus to see whether it could? I mean, I did the same when I fixed the ventilation pipes and – –"

"You are being very naïve and annoyingly pedantic. And I wouldn't believe that for a second. Didn't you ever notice anything odd about its questions or alchemy skills?"

Shrike stared sadly at Armstrong. "What, like something about the making of the Philosopher's Stone or something? No, sir, nothing," he said absent-mindedly and did not bother to start explaining the very difficult questions it had asked, questions that he could not believe a beginning alchemist would know to ask. He did not even think they were related to it creating a homunculus, but to its oddly selective knowledge of alchemy. He looked down after a pause and a couple of tears fell down his face. "U-uh... if that's all, I'd just like to leave and..."

Armstrong glared at Shrike and felt frustrated. "You're obviously upset because you saw it get blown up. Didn't I tell you to not get too attached to it?"

"Uh... I just... didn't expect it to die, sir."

"I can't be sure that it really is dead."

"W-what? How can it – –"

"It regenerates and needs to be killed several times before it dies."

Shrike looked at Armstrong again and hope lighted up in his eyes. "S-so Envy is still alive?!"

Armstrong stared at Shrike. "That possibility exists. Does that concern you in any manner?"

Shrike frowned deeply and turned his eyes away again. "...I see."

Armstrong looked at Shrike in an odd manner. "If it is still alive, do you think that I should let it live?"

"Well, yes, sir."

"Then why did you agree to freeze it?"

"I... I didn't think about what I was doing, sir."

Armstrong refrained from slapping Shrike's face or her own and instead blinked heavily. At least he had not tried to think up any ridiculous excuse. For a short moment, she stared at him with piercing disappointment. Shrike felt extremely squirmy. "Why should I let it live?"

"Er... I don't... I mean, all it did was create one homunculus, if that's really even true. Maybe someone framed it? And besides, it can't perform alchemy now so it can't make another one, right? Why can't it have one homunculus friend? A-and I don't think it hates us THAT much, or maybe it would eventually grow to not hate us, I mean, I once asked whether it liked me, and it said that of all humans, it disliked me the least. That, uh, well, that wasn't what I wanted it to say but I think it was the truth."

"Stop hallucinating! It worked behind my back, betrayed my trust, studied alchemy against my direct order and attacked my soldiers. It is dangerous to humankind and hates us. If there is nothing it can't do and we can't control it, it needs to be eliminated."

"It didn't even kill anyone, sir!" shouted Shrike.

"Ramillies is in a coma, Pelayo is probably paralysed for the rest of his life and Junkers is in critical condition! The two others have at least a concussion and some broken bones. Maybe it didn't manage to kill them, but I can't fault it for the lack of attempt!"

Shrike looked distressed. "Because you attacked it! Do we always have to respond with increased violence, sir? Will we just go round and round forever in this stupid vicious circle? And if it specifically wanted to kill them, it woul– –"

"Silence!" Armstrong had had it with Shrike's whining. "Do not base your speculations on wishful thinking. Dismissed. The next time we speak, show me proper respect," she said. Her tone was so threatening that anyone could have heard the words "or else" added to the end.

"Y-yes, sir." Shrike was nearly panic-struck and walked out of the room on rather wobbly feet. He did not run only because he thought he would fall if he did.

Armstrong looked after Shrike and sighed. The only good thing about the situation seemed to be that Shrike had actually managed to summon the courage to oppose her. She considered whether Shrike would defy her and try to somehow help Envy, but trusted his loyalty despite his feelings and his unsure and not-black-and-white way of thinking.

Now the Major General faced a very irritating decision. If she told Mustang that she had let Envy get away, he might be angry and determined enough to get her replaced, perhaps not immediately but at the least when he got himself promoted again.

She resented the man for cutting off in front of her as the next leader of the state. Of course, the future of the whole country had been more important, but still, Mustang had also been in the middle of it and had been spared from all the blame. Grumman was still the Führer and seemed to much prefer Mustang to be his follower rather than her. In addition, the highest power was now in the control of some clueless civilians and there was talk of eliminating the position of führer altogether. Armstrong opposed the idea vehemently, but almost none of the other high-ranks did.

She still had the Fort. She would not give it up.

Armstrong's next option was to say that she had killed Envy. That would be believable enough, but it would cause her trouble to no end if it turned out to be untrue and the others found out that Envy was still alive.

The third option was that she could inform that she had set Envy free. She did not even know herself why she would say that at first, and it took her some time to think of reasons, each of which was more or less ridiculous. If she said she had sent Envy to assassinate Mustang, everyone would know that there was something fishy going on, because if she really had done that, she would definitely not have said that. What if she had told Envy to leave, never come back and do what it wanted with its life? That sounded better already, but even she could not help rolling her eyes at that. Mustang would still label her as unable to perform her duties.

Armstrong thought that none of her options were good. On top of everything, she detested lying.

In the end, she decided not to lie, but left her own suspicions out of her report. Envy being dead seemed to be the most believable case, and it was plausible since homunculi left no body behind. Envy's death would be very difficult if not completely impossible to verify. Even her subordinates had seen Envy get blown up into nothingness, had found nothing in the vicinity and believed it was dead. Of course, there was the possibility that it truly was dead. Even if its assumed tiny lizard form had been still alive when it blew up, it would not survive the extreme cold. Such a tiny creature would immediately freeze and never melt in the Briggs Mountains.

Armstrong made the phone call as soon as she had decided what to say. She explained that she had killed Envy several times but it had managed to get outside the Fort, which was when they had shot it with a powerful explosive and it had disintegrated and not reappeared. That was reason enough to assume that Envy was dead. Naturally, Mustang had difficulty taking the news without any proof but eventually conceded since he could not prove anything to the contrary and he thought that Armstrong had no reason to lie.

Thus, Armstrong's immediate problem was solved, but now she really needed a plan to find out whether Envy was alive, a way to deal with it if it was and a way to keep the whole deal hidden if it came to that.

Armstrong cursed herself under her breath for letting Envy get away and spent time in her office with Major Rodney, pondering the best courses of action in the case that Envy was still alive.

The easiest option was to wait until Envy acted again, but the consequences of that might be catastrophic. If Envy had somehow grown patience – as its studying of alchemy suggested – it could go under the radar for a very long time and amass an army of homunculi. Of course, if Armstrong was the only one who would be able to defend the country, the tables would likely turn to her favour. However, in that case, many people would end up losing their lives, and even Armstrong was not so ambitious as to disregard the lives of the common people just like that. More of an issue was that Envy might actually wait until she and all who had known it would be dead.

The best way would be if she had some kind of way of following it, but tracking a shapeshifting creature would be next to impossible. The only thing that was always special about Envy was its weight, but it knew how to handle that carefully enough so as to not clue people in on that very easily. In addition, after the revelation that Envy had somehow moved through the ventilation shafts, Armstrong was not all that sure about its claim of having an immense weight either.

Another way would be to draw it out into the open somehow. She got the idea that she could send a team of soldiers as bait and see if Envy would attack them, but that would risk the soldiers' lives in a rather unnecessary manner. The idea might not even work and Armstrong could not be sure where Envy was in the first place. She then thought about Shrike and wondered whether Envy was interested in what happened to him. She felt just Shrike might be worth risking, and he was the most likely person to draw Envy out. But if Shrike did manage to connect with Envy, what could he do? Alone, he could do nothing to it. At the most, he could be able to lead it into a trap. And even that would probably succeed only if Shrike was not told about the intent to lure Envy into a trap.

Armstrong did not yet decide anything. Among other things, she wanted Shrike to have at least some knowledge of the attempt to draw Envy out, and she needed to figure out how much she could tell him without him being able to unknowingly warn Envy.

* * *

Two days later, Shrike had just gotten the last cup of coffee from a coffeemaker, had started brewing a new pot and was now watching the machine as it bubbled. Massena came into the lounge and walked up behind him. She poured herself a mugful from another coffeemaker and then turned at Shrike.

"Shrike, over here."

Shrike startled slightly and turned to see Massena starting walk away. He got up and for a short moment, felt anxious about having to delegate the coffee-making to someone else. "Can someone watch the coffee for me, please?" he said at the closest group of soldiers who were playing a card game.

"Sure," said one of them.

"Thanks," replied Shrike, took his coffee mug and went after Massena. He followed her to her room.

Massena sat on a chair in front of her workdesk. "Sit down," she said and waved at the second chair in her room.

Shrike closed the door and sat down. "Er... You want to talk about what happened the day before yesterday, right, sir? I-I'm sorry that I said that... that I was so impolite."

"You better be. The important thing is that you care about your inexcusable and utterly unprofessional behaviour yourself."

"Uh, sir... s-speaking of 'unprofessional'..."

"You mean the way I talked to you in that corridor? You're right, but consider it this way: Starting to suddenly cry like that is what children do. You do come off childish otherwise too. So I tried to provoke you like I would a child. Well, a preteen I guess, my little brother always threw a fit when I talked to him like that. You didn't fall for it, which is good as far as I'm concerned."

"O-oh."

"Either way, what I want to talk about is why you suddenly collapsed and became unfit to perform your duties. How is that even possible? I do understand that it's a big deal to lose a loved one and that it was shocking to find out that she was an enemy and such a freak, but it shouldn't render you incapable of doing anything."

"I... I've thought about that but I can't really give a good explanation. I'm sorry, sir. I just couldn't have imagined something like that ever happening... I guess I really thought it was impossible even though that doesn't make sense because of course that could happen. I mean, Envy um... d-dying... or that uh, other stuff... B-but I was already off duty, and then I calmed down in the recovery room and afterwards I went to fix that room next to the outdoor air processing centre."

"I can understand the monster thing, but you couldn't imagine her dying?" asked Massena confusedly. "Almost everybody in this nation has lost a family member or friend in a war. 25 of us died in Central. Do you really claim that you didn't know any of them? Two of them were from my unit, you must have known them!"

"Well, yes... but... They just... went there and didn't come back. My father does that kind of stuff all the time, though he hasn't managed to get himself killed yet. And I, well, I've never actually lost anyone. I was too young to remember it when my mother died. Also... I mean, I hadn't even dated anyone before this, sir."

"WHAT? Are you serious?" Massena stared at Shrike as if he were a fifteen-year-old rebelling against his parents.

Shrike, then again, seemed very serious but also confused. He stared back at Massena with wide, child-like eyes. "Did I say something wrong, sir?" he asked cautiously.

"Exactly how old were you again? 24? You can't be even that young, you were here when I came here seven years ago."

"...28 now, sir. 29 in a couple of months."

Massena just stared at him with her mouth open. If Shrike had not felt so incredibly inconvenienced, he would have been amused at her expression. "And you've... never dated... anyone?"

"...No."

Massena had an extremely peculiar expression on her face and Shrike wished he could interpret it somehow, but since he was unable to, he just stared at her sullenly. "And your first girlfriend turned out to be some kind of monster." Shrike looked away. "Right, fine. I get it. That collapse of yours was immature and you can be lucky we only had to fight against that one enemy and the situation was over, or you might have died. Still, I'm not so heartless as to punish or demote you because of the first time you make that kind of mistake, especially since you were technically off duty and didn't endanger anyone else with that little display. And because, seriously, that monster. Just make sure that the next time that... something like that happens, you're prepared enough to keep going."

"...I, um, yes, sir. I'll try, sir..."

"Good." Massena seemed more relaxed and sipped her coffee. "Well, as long as you're here, do you have anything else to talk about?" She brought the mug to her lips again and then stared at it.

Shrike also sipped his coffee that was not quite warm any longer. His mind was blank. "No, sir, I can't think of any now at least."

"Well, if you do, come talk then. I know some men say talking about their problems is useless, but generally, if you actually think about things and can't solve them yourself, then it's a good idea to talk about them too. And I can see you benefit from talking, even if it was inconvenient."

"Yes, sir." Shrike got up and left. He felt annoyed because him having dated no one before should not have been such a big thing.

* * *

Yet another two days later, Armstrong had contemplated her options. Since she believed Envy was still alive, she devised a good enough plan to draw Envy out and lure it into a trap. She summoned Shrike to hear her plan.

"You know most of the people believe that we managed to kill Envy, but I'm still suspicious of that. Therefore, I want to try to lure it out, and you're probably the best way to do that at the moment. You need to go to North City and make yourself known somehow, that should draw its attention to you and when it finds you, you can talk to it. If that doesn't work, repeat the same first in Central and then in East City, since those are the most likely places Envy would be in. I believe it would try to find the other homunculus, and Envy will probably think that Mustang is holding it in Central or East."

Shrike stared at Armstrong. Armstrong waited until Shrike had managed to absorb the information. "Make myself known, sir?"

"I don't care how you do that, but I recommend you don't do anything illegal."

"B-but how would I...?"

"I don't know. Try your alchemy, I would guess that is the easiest way. Put out a burning building or something. I'm sure you know that they still have problems with faulty heating systems that start fires. Or maybe you can melt the dock area."

"O-oh..." Shrike seemed very contemplative for a moment. "Um, if Envy contacts me, what then?"

"Then you will at some point lead it to a specific alley where we can capture it. After that, we can talk with it."

"Talk, sir? But you tried to kill it. I don't think it would fall for that..."

"Then don't tell about that to it. Figure out some other way to get it there. Come up with that way on your own. Of course you need to also be able to inform us when that is going to happen, approximately. We can't wait there every day."

"What do I do in North City once I get there? I don't think I can be around in public practising goodwill all the time, sir."

"Hm... I'll arrange it so that you'll be temporarily transferred to North City for lighter duties so that you could study alchemy."

Shrike was pleased and nodded.

"Do you have a place of residence in North City?"

"Yes, sir, but it's on the other side of the city than headquarters."

"Well, travelling that distance often ought to give you opportunities for some gratuitous displays of alchemy."

"Um, maybe... But then I'd rather not have everyone know where I live. If I make myself known like that, some people are bound to follow me around and bother me, and that might even prevent Envy from contacting me..."

"Stay at headquarters then."

"So... I'll go to North City, do something with alchemy so that people will notice me..."

"Try to get on the radio and in the newspapers."

Shrike became pale and felt light-headed.

"I can guess you aren't one who would enjoy publicity, but once you're done with this, you can just come back to Briggs and nobody will bother you."

"Y-yes, sir... And then, once Envy finds me, I'll try to meet it in that alley... and then you can capture it. How long should I wait for Envy?"

"Hm... a month."

"Yes, sir."

"Here is the information you'll need." Armstrong gave Shrike a sheet of paper that listed the phone numbers and addresses Shrike might need. "When will you be ready to leave?"

"Um, I can leave now, but tomorrow would be better because I still have a three-hour shift in the evening, sir."

"Fine, leave tomorrow when the supply truck is leaving. Dismissed. Telephone if you run into trouble."

"Yes, sir."

The next day, Shrike packed most of his things and books and left on a supply truck.


	12. Solitude

Envy found itself in a crevasse in the walls of the mountain pass that Fort Briggs blocked.

Wanting to cry in pain but not being able to, Envy regenerated just enough to reform its body. Once it no longer hurt, it shapeshifted into a bear and crawled deeper into the crevasse, away from Fort Briggs. It trudged toward southeast and eventually figured that it would be better to dig into the snow and wait until the worst of the storm was over. It did just that and kept itself warm by cursing Armstrong and her subordinates to extraordinarily hellish cesspools. Once the storm subsided enough, it started moving again. Even without the piercing wind, the mid-winter weather was very cold and it had to remind itself to keep moving briskly to keep itself from freezing. It was angry at not having read anything more about how animals kept themselves warm in these kind of environments since it was sure it could have done something better to preserve its heat.

Envy finally understood what had happened to it in the room where it was first attacked. The extreme coldness had been because of Shrike's alchemy! Envy felt even angrier, but it also remembered the way Shrike had looked at it when it had passed him while impersonating Mil. He had been more than a little scared and even more clueless than usual. He probably had not even known what he was doing.

Envy kept moving and thought about what it should do now. It wanted to rescue the homunculus child, but it did not even know if it was alive. It decided to go check out the abandoned farm and their secondary meeting place, but first it wanted to get some protective equipment, and food would not be unwelcome either.

If the child was alive, how could Envy rescue it? Should it rescue it? Envy thought that going straight into Mustang's sandbox must have been the worst idea ever, but it had to admit to itself that it detested the idea of leaving the homunculus for him to burn through after all the trouble it had went through to create it – and after its inability to avenge Lust's death. Maybe it could kill two birds with one stone and both rescue the homunculus and kill Mustang. That idea appealed to Envy. The only thing it thought it really needed to do was to somehow counter Mustang's alchemy just long enough for it to kill him. And it would kill him instantly, right away, without gloating so that he would not have time to burn it even once. He would die anyway, so it could save the bragging and think of the effects of his death, for upon that, his idiotic friends would be devastated and thus Envy's revenge would be manyfold! With just one person's death, perhaps as many as a couple of dozen people would cry their eyes out. His little platonic girlfriend might even commit suicide like she had implied on the Promised Day. Then Envy would just disappear, satisfied and not alone, and leave them wallowing in their stupid misery. Envy giggled to itself as it thought about how Mustang's friends would suffer.

Mustang would most likely be keeping the child in Central or East City. He did not have any other places and Envy was sure he would not be keeping a homunculus in some flat or another. Envy could not know in which of the two cities the child would be or where exactly, but it definitely knew a lot about secret hideouts especially in Central, so if need be, it would just comb through all of them one by one. If Mustang had not killed the child right away, he would probably not kill it later either, and thus Envy would have time to look. It only needed to be careful so that no one would ever discover it until it was too late. And that was rather easy because of its abilities. But what if the humans had learned? What if they now had secret handshakes or some other silly way of identification now? Envy sighed and decided that it would investigate that first before it would dive into the army headquarters to look for things.

One thing Envy dreaded was the fact that Mustang and his people would definitely be waiting for it. If they had captured the homunculus, they had to know that Envy would be coming to get it, and they could prepare for that. Envy considered leaving them in constant anticipation and wait for a few years, but then it thought that they might kill the homunculus child once they were sure enough that it would not be coming.

Envy walked around for two days and made sure to occasionally dig through the snow and cross some impassable areas just so no human could reasonably follow it. It ate the animals and a few young trees that came across it.

Later Envy arrived at the edges of a small town it had probably never been in. It found a group of tourists on a skiing trip, captured them and spent about four hours torturing and eating them. That made it feel better momentarily, but afterwards it thought that killing them had been fairly pointless – they had done nothing to Envy and it did not know of any of their relatives that would be devastated because of their deaths. Once it found their truck, it also realised that once the tourists' deaths were discovered, that would draw an investigation and certain people would probably draw conclusions about its involvement in their deaths. Envy raged and fumed quietly, cursing its hideous luck. It decided against stealing their clothes since even those could probably be tracked. Instead, it noted that they had left money in the truck and stole that.

It took a winding route to the town's main road, changed into a large and friendly-looking man and made its way to the centre of the town. Once there, it discreetly stole some more money and bought clothes and other winter equipment. Normally Envy would have just stolen the things it needed instead of bothering with money, but it understood now that money was much more impersonal. Money was the same pieces of paper and metal as always. People could not tell one note apart from another. If it instead had stolen a set of winter clothes, that would be more likely to be noticed and then everyone would know what it had taken.

Now no one knew.

Envy took its skis and other equipment and headed back into the forest. It spent over a day looking for the abandoned farm and eventually found it. It was careful in approaching the place, but concluded soon enough that the place was deserted. More snow had come down and not many tracks remained, but Envy could still see that some skiers had been there. Inside the stony barn it could see the boot-prints of at least two soldiers. Inside the main building it could see nothing of note since it did not know how to recognise tracks that were something else than plain footprints. Nonetheless, it could not find signs of violence anywhere, and those it at least knew to look for.

Since Envy found nothing, it left and headed for their secondary meeting place. The trip there took a bit over half a day. The place was untouched.

Envy left, heading toward southwest. Eventually it crossed the main road that led from North City to Fort Briggs, but it did not want to travel by that since it would be seen and somebody might get suspicious. Also because it could just travel through the forest without too much trouble, it did so.

Since there was very little that Envy could do, it paid detailed attention to its surroundings, perhaps for the first time in its life. It could travel in peace since there were only few animals in the northern forests, especially in mid-winter – and if it did not run across animals itself, the animals stayed the hell away from it.

Envy was very bored the first few days, but after it had gotten used to not talking, not being talked to and not even seeing other humans, it started to appreciate the nature around it. The nature was neutral; it just was there. It did not like or dislike Envy. Envy did not like or dislike it. Envy was not jealous of it. The nature accepted Envy's presence, let it be as it was and did not make any demands of it. The weather was not exactly forgiving, but Envy managed well enough.

The only thing it needed to concern itself with was the terrain. It skied over the mountains, crossed hills, climbed cliffs, sped along the ground and circled boulders. The forests hid it and provided shelter from the worst freezing winds. Impossible ledges posed an interesting challenge that it conquered with the help of its abilities. Steep ridges stood in its way, but such obstacles did not discourage it and it skied over them. It gleefully skied downhill from any elevations of the land, its weight preventing it from going uncontrollably fast in the loose snow. When it could not ski down, it jumped from great heights and landed in soft piles of snow. From its landing site, it dug a tunnel and exited in some quite different a place.

In its boredom, Envy even paid more attention to the views that the earth and sky offered. It had to admit that the sceneries were pretty easy on the eyes. The snow-covered forests and mountains and the frozen rivers and lakes looked quite nice. Though it did not quite believe it itself, Envy found the sky even prettier and took it as a habit to look at the sky with its enhanced vision as it pondered about the mysteries behind the stars, fogs, light clusters and other visual phenomena it witnessed.

Envy realised that what this picture was missing was humans. Humans could not follow it where it travelled. Humans did not wander in the impassable mountains, in the freezing forests or on possibly treacherous ice over bodies of water. Humans could not fly. They had not polluted the sky in any way and had nothing to do with it. Here, the only one who existed was Envy.

As much as it appreciated the tranquillity of being free from humans, Envy was still fantastically bored. However, with nothing to grow angry at, Envy let its boredom wash over it and calm it. There was nothing it could do about the ennui but it did not need to.

* * *

Nine days after Armstrong had driven it from Fort Briggs, Envy arrived at a small town that was near to North City. It figured it could steal and eat some animal and also buy some good-tasting food for a change, since raw animal meat and frozen trees were not exactly tasty.

When it was buying the food, it noticed a newspaper on a table in the establishment. The newspaper had a very interesting article. Envy felt like laughing, but it controlled itself and instead read the small article. It was mostly about Shrike – or 'Kain Strike' as the newspaper had named him. He had generously saved North City's dock area that had been blockaded by ice. The city's icebreaker was broken and the ice had been threatening to break the dock structures, but Shrike had solved the issue by melting most of the ice. The article claimed that he had been in Fort Briggs, had been fired and was now in North City, studying to become a state alchemist.

Envy wondered what the real reason was. Maybe Armstrong had indeed fired him since he had not managed to freeze it? Maybe he was acting as bait for it? Maybe he had resigned after he had realised that he had tried to kill Envy himself? Envy grinned and wondered if it should do something about him. Even though he had tried to kill it, Envy was not particularly angry about that any longer. Maybe it should ask him whether that had really been his intent. He would not be able to lie to it either way, and then it could kill him if he really had tried to kill it. Then Envy wondered if he would be somehow useful to it. Having some alchemical backup was of course good, even if the backup was a pacifist coward like Shrike. It could ask him to come with it, or force him if he did not want to come. The bad side would be that he would also hinder it – he needed to sleep regularly and eat proper food, could not disguise himself and could not lie to save his life. Of course, Envy could take Shrike along and leave him on the way if he became too much of a burden.

It could not resist its curiosity. It ate its food, bought a chocolate cake to go and ate it once it had gotten out of people's sights. It then took its skis and headed for North City on yet another interestingly winding route.

While it travelled, Envy tried to recall whether Shrike had ever told it where he lived. It figured that he had not, but it could remember seeing an envelope with the address on it. Envy tried to recall the street's name but could not be sure of it, so once it arrived in North City, it spent some time going through a telephone directory in a phone booth, looking for his name and address. Envy found some Shannon Shrike and assumed that was his father. The directory listed the phone number as being disconnected, but the address seemed valid. Envy remembered the address on Shrike's envelope seeming similar.

Envy made its way toward the place where Shrike's home should be. Once it arrived in the general area, it thought that maybe it should be more careful and not walk right up to his front door, just in case it was being lured into a trap. It decided to wait outside and watch the stars. It practised making its eyes work like a telescope, which was much harder than it had thought.

People started moving about in the morning, but it was still dark at that time. Envy waited for Shrike to come out. Eventually, he exited the building in which his flat was located. Envy stalked him as he walked through the city. He fixed a dent on a car along his way and received many thanks from the car's owner.

Shrike went into North City's military headquarters but did not stay there any longer than a few hours. He then walked around and played a good little Samaritan, using his alchemy to help people in small ways. Envy had no idea why he did that and followed him with mild curiosity. He then went back to the headquarters, then to the library and then back again. In the evening, he surprisingly did not leave for his home.

Envy waited and stalked him the next day too, and it seemed like he was not going to go back to his flat. Apparently he had only spent the weekend there and was otherwise staying in the headquarters.


	13. Traitor

After another day of stalking had passed, Envy decided to talk to Shrike. It did that as simply as grabbing his arm while he was walking on a street and pulling him into a side alley. Of course, it was disguised as someone else entirely, so Shrike was very confused.

"Um... Excuse me?"

"Darn, Shrike, it's me." Envy stared at him and changed its eyes to its normal violet and slitted ones for a short moment.

"Envy!" whispered Shrike. "I... I thought you were dead!"

"That was exaggeration."

"I-I was so worried."

"Yeah, yeah – – Really? Worried? Heh." Envy looked somewhat amused. "Well, I guess that's a good thing." Envy looked at Shrike's expression and wondered what all it displayed, since it was definitely interesting now. "I suppose then that you didn't plan to kill me despite that hideous alchemy trick?" it asked in a more serious tone.

"E-eh... I was... I didn't even know what I was doing first, Armstrong just told me to do it and I didn't have time to think because she, well, she made me upset before that and... If I had known what I would be doing, I'd have said no. But she probably would have forced me to do it then. I don't know, it's, I mean, soldiers shouldn't think too much but just do what their commanding officers do but I've been told that it's also good to think for yourself, so I really don't know what they're trying to do with that."

"Shrike, ramble ramble."

"Uh, sorry."

"So you wouldn't have done it if you had known why you were doing it?"

"Right... I couldn't have, I'd have been so upset."

"Well, that sounded sincere enough."

"And when you got blown up, I... uh, that was horrible. I just..." Shrike trailed off and shook his head.

"...You WOULD have been upset? You seem upset now, and it's been like two weeks and you know now that I'm alive."

"Uh... Anyway, Massena yelled at me and almost demoted me, and Armstrong was rather... er, harsh. Well, more than normal, I think."

"Huh? Why?"

"Well, I was just... really upset."

Envy could tell that Shrike was not telling everything. However, it was not too interested in exploring what he was not telling because it thought that it was clear enough that he had not wanted or truly intended to kill it.

"Huh. Listen, let's get away from here. Some place with less people."

"U-uh, okay."

"I know a place, come on."

Envy started walking and Shrike followed it. They did not go very far, less than two kilometres. They talked about the weather while walking.

They eventually arrived at a slightly better hideout.

"Does Armstrong know that I'm alive?" asked Envy once they were comfortably alone.

"Well, she couldn't know but she assumed so."

"Why are you even here?"

"I, uh... Well, I'm on a sort of lighter duty period so I can study alchemy."

"Really? Then what the heck are you doing prancing around the town being all generous and helpful? That doesn't strike me as something that you would do. Are you sure you're not acting as bait to get to me?" Shrike looked shocked enough that Envy guessed that it had hit the truth. "Yeah, it was that obvious. So, what does Armstrong want with me?"

Shrike had to wait for a moment for his shock to wear off. Once it did, he did not try to deny that he had been supposed to draw Envy's interest. "She just wants to talk with you. If you could meet he– –"

"What kind of moron is she anyway? She tried to kill me! I am not talking to her until she apologises for trying to kill me, tries to make up for it and actually does something that benefits me, like killing off that horrible prick Mustang."

"...Major General Mustang?"

"What? Was he promoted again already?" asked Envy, annoyed.

"Well, Führer Grumman has decided he will be his follower so he's been getting promoted."

"Ugh! All the more reason for Armstrong to kill him!"

"Um... Why do you hate him so much?"

"Why?! Surely you're kidding! Eh, I probably didn't tell you. Well then, here it is: he killed me several times. Just burned me, like that." Envy snapped its fingers at Shrike. "Do you have any idea what it feels like when your body is burning?"

Shrike apparently had a very vivid imagination because he suddenly became very pale and just stared at Envy for a moment, unable to say anything. After some time he managed to mumble something. "N-no..."

"Well, hope you never will. Then again, you would die instantly if it happened to you. I've seen humans pass out because of pain with far less injuries and die because of pain from a single burned lower leg." Shrike was still shaken. "Well, you can't get me to meet her just like that. What next? Will you still try to get me into a trap so she can try to kill me?"

"No! I wouldn't do that..."

"What then?"

"I-I don't know."

"What do you think I'll do?"

"Um, I... no. I don't know."

"Armstrong probably said I'd go look for the homunculus in Central, right?"

Shrike was taken by surprise again. "U-uh, yeah. Um, what's this thing about another homunculus? Did you really create one?"

Envy looked at Shrike a little contemplatively but then just shrugged. "Oh well, there's no reason not to tell. Sure, I created it. I did it last November, and that was actually the reason why I suddenly stopped being able to perform alchemy. What I don't know is why exactly creating a homunculus took away my alchemy abilities. I also lost half of my body and didn't regenerate my mass back, so if you noticed that I weighed less, it was because of that. I had to give the homunculus a part of my Philosopher's Stone and half of my soul since I had no idea how much would be enough."

Shrike stared wide-eyedly at Envy. "H-how does that work?"

"Why, do you want to create a homunculus too?"

"A-ah, no, I don't think so..."

"I don't know how you could solve the soul problem. Unless humans can just spontaneously create souls by using a part of yourself, like when you breed. I guess it would work that way."

"Um... Will you be able to perform alchemy again?"

"I sure hope so. My best guess is that I have to get my soul back the way it was before I made the homunculus somehow, but who knows how long that would take. It could be years."

Shrike was oddly expressionless. "Will you make more homunculi then?"

Envy scoffed. "Do you know how much that takes? I have so little energy left in my Philosopher's Stone that I can't probably create another homunculus for a century unless I actually make new Philosopher's Stones with alchemy, and that's not easy. I'd have to get away with killing a lot of people and I'd have to find out how exactly that transmutation worked." It sighed. "Why didn't I study that more when I had the chance? I understand how to make homunculi a lot better. And even if I made more Philosopher's Stones, I'd have to give the new homunculi a real soul of some kind, and since I only have my own, that limits it a lot."

"Armstrong was afraid that you'd create an army of homunculi..."

"Ha!" Envy gave a bitter laugh and looked somewhat derisively at Shrike. "Well, if I had enough Philosopher's Stones, I could probably make some mannequin soldiers. But they're thoroughly boring. They don't even talk really and they're easy to repel if you know what you're doing because they're so dumb."

"But... If you don't know how to make Philosopher's Stones, where do you get more of it in the first place?"

Envy looked at Shrike somewhat pensively again. "Ah well. When I gain weight by eating, I can shapeshift that mass away and it's then stored as energy in my Philosopher's Stone. If you remember, that's what I meant when I was so excited about being able to shapeshift my gained weight away."

Shrike frowned, but his expression cleared after a moment. "Oh! Wow, that's... that's convenient. Is that why you've been eating so much?"

"Yeah. Gaining Stone that way is painfully slow of course, but still better than nothing."

"But that's great! I mean, now you don't need to kill humans just to get more Philosopher's Stone, right?"

"Hmm." Envy did not look all that thrilled about it.

"You don't think it's a good thing?"

"You obviously do."

"Uh. Well, yeah."

"I still say it's better than nothing."

"But you'd rather make Philosopher's Stones out of people since you'd get more in a less amount of time...?" Envy did not reply. "Do you really hate humans that much?"

"Yeah, you're disgusting."

"I... Why? I mean, even I think the bulk of humans are annoying and not worth my attention and Linke probably truly hates a lot of humans, but we don't want to kill everyone because of that."

"That's just you being overly sentimental and inefficient."

"But don't you think it'd be pretty boring without any humans?"

"Hm, I suppose, but I wouldn't kill off all of them, of course. Just enough to make them so scared that they'd never defy me."

"Uh..."

"Don't worry, I wouldn't kill you."

"Yes but... it just wouldn't be... Couldn't you prove your superiority in some way that didn't kill so many people? I mean, if you kill people, the others might fear you but they'd never trust you and they'd rebel eventually... I-I think it might be better if you did something really awesome that humans couldn't do."

Envy made a spontaneous smirk as it noticed that what Shrike said reminded it very much of its early ideas when it was trying to come up with something to motivate it to not kill people or gloat to them. "Yeah yeah, sure. I thought of that a long time ago but it's a bit hard to accomplish when people like Armstrong snap at the first sign of breakthrough on my part. Like being the first ever successful creator of a homunculus after the one who created me."

Shrike was immediately interested in Envy's new topic. "Who created you?"

"Another homunculus. Actually... I'm the third successful creator since some ancient humans managed to create my creator a long time ago. But they're no longer alive so who cares." Envy shrugged.

"What does one need to create a homunculus?"

Envy smirked. "So now you are interested?"

"Well... theoretically..."

"There are a few nice catches to it, which is probably why Amestrians have never succeeded in it. But I can't just tell it like that! Why don't you help me with my problem and then I'll tell?"

"With your problem?"

"Yeah, I need to save that homunculus I created. Of course I'm not entirely sure it's still alive, so the first thing is to find out is whether it is alive. So, how about it?"

"O-oh... um, I'm not sure."

"Yeah, you probably need to ask Armstrong whether that's okay with her or something," said Envy casually, mocking Shrike's difficulties in making his own decisions.

"Errr..."

Envy frowned then as it weighed the consequences of Shrike telling and not telling Armstrong about him going with it. If Envy let Shrike tell Armstrong that he was going to go to Central with Envy, she could somehow prepare for that and alert Mustang as well. Then again, they were probably already preparing for that since Armstrong had assumed Envy was alive. If Envy just took Shrike with it right now, he would effectively disappear and Armstrong would be confused. What would she do? She would try to find him, but would she assume that Envy had killed him or kidnapped him, or something else entirely?

"Uh... Envy?"

"Shut up, I'm thinking."

Shrike was quiet for a moment. "...About what?"

Envy just glared at him and resumed thinking. Armstrong would probably command Shrike to go with Envy and keep an eye on it that way. Maybe she would have soldiers follow Shrike around, ready to ambush it when it spoke to him again. Then again, spotting stalkers was not all that hard, so Envy could see what would happen and act accordingly. It also thought that abducting Shrike would probably aggravate Armstrong, which would be quite annoying.

"Eh, go along then, I don't care. Tell her I'm going to Central or whatever. If she assumes I'm alive, she'd assume I'd try to find the homunculus anyway. Knowing that won't help her."

"Uh."

"Well, I'm all done. You can go now. Make up your mind and tell me whether you'll come with me."

"But, uh, how will I contact you when I want to talk to you again?"

"You don't. I'll find you one day so just keep on doing whatever it is you're doing and I'll come pull you aside. Well, go along then!" Envy shooed him and Shrike left, slightly confused.

Shrike decided to not go to North City's military headquarters right away. He walked around and pondered whether he should go with Envy. Of course, he did need the permission from Armstrong to go with it; he could not get around that.

After he had started heading back to headquarters, he came across and fixed some child's broken kicksled. That made him think about all the stunts he had performed in the city to get noticed. Fixing people's things was not something that people had noticed. Almost no one still knew him and he was so stressed about it that he could only go out and fix a thing or two before returning to a peaceful place to calm down and rest. He had gotten lucky with the docks. Melting the ice there had been both very easy and very noticeable. Naturally, as the local newspaper had interviewed him, they had gotten about half the facts wrong and misspelled his name.

Once Shrike got back to headquarters, he spent nearly two hours on the phone, waiting for a technician to make sure the line was secure, telling a resident Colonel to give him privacy and waiting until Armstrong was available for talking to him. He thought about what he would say to her.

"What is it?" she asked when she finally came on.

"Ah, Major General, I met Envy today," replied Shrike. "I tried to suggest to it to meet you at that place you designated, but it said it wouldn't. It specifically said that it wouldn't meet you or anyone in any place other than what it could choose... It was very adamant about that."

"Hmph."

"It did say that it could meet you if you did something that obviously benefited it, like uh... killing Major General Mustang."

"Good grief."

"But it also told me all kinds of things. It said that it had created the homunculus, but doing that had apparently cost half of its Philosopher's Stone and its own soul and that was why it suddenly couldn't do alchemy any longer. It said that it wouldn't be able to make another homunculus for... for decades, I think."

"Hm. That would be a small relief, but can you be in any way certain that it was not lying?"

"Probably not, but I don't see a reason why it would have lied, sir."

"To make us think that it was not that dangerous?"

"O-oh... yes, sir. But it didn't seem to care about not seeming dangerous when it went on about hating humans."

Armstrong sighed at the phone. "Why is that thing so incomprehensible?"

"Er... It then said that it was going to go to Central and try to rescue the new homunculus it created."

"How does it know it's in Central?"

"Um, I don't know."

"Are you sure it didn't just say that to confuse you? And – –" Armstrong went suddenly completely silent. "Wait a moment." She put the phone on the table.

Shrike wondered what was up and waited.

About five minutes later, an armed team of soldiers rushed into the communications room and aimed rifles and even one rocket launcher at Shrike. Shrike did not even know why he did not simply faint right there. He lifted his arms straight up into the air and made a small whimper.

No one got violent, and after a short moment, the least armed soldier put his weapons away and took a knife holder with a regular knife in it from his belt. "Warrant Officer Kaine Shrike?"

"Y-y-yes?"

"Here's a knife. Catch it." The soldier waited a moment and then threw the knife holder to Shrike. Unsurprisingly, Shrike fumbled with it and dropped it. "Pick it up."

Shrike did so. "Ah... What..."

"This will probably sound weird, but take that knife and cut yourself with it. Just a small wound so that it bleeds. Okay?"

"W-what? Why?"

"I don't know, but don't delay."

Shrike slowly took the knife out of the holder and looked at it. "Uh... uh... where should I...?"

"What? I don't know, pick a part." The soldier looked at his own hand. "The side of your thumb?"

"E-eh..." Shrike took his time, but soon enough he cut himself on the side of his thumb. "Er... i-it's bleeding." He lifted his shaking hand so that the soldiers could see.

"Good. Next, get some blood on the knife, put it back in the holder and throw it back to me."

Shrike had no idea why he needed to do that too but now he did not think to even question the command any longer. He did what the soldier asked.

The soldier caught the knife and checked it. "Okay, we're done. Stand down, everyone. Sorry about that." The soldier headed outside.

"Er... C-can I get a bandage...?"

"Oh, right. Medic." The soldier got on a telephone while another soldier with a medical kit came to Shrike and tied up the small wound. After the first soldier had gotten off of the telephone, he came back. "Okay, everyone, let's go. You can get back on the phone," he said to Shrike.

The soldiers got out of the communications room and left Shrike alone. He collapsed on the chair and picked up the phone.

"Shrike?" came Armstrong's voice. "I merely had to make sure you weren't Envy."

"A-ah... I-I see... B-But couldn't you just have asked me something that Envy wouldn't know? Like my mother's name or address or..."

"I don't know what Envy doesn't know. That was the only way to be sure."

"H-how..."

"Envy's blood and other parts disappear when separated from it, didn't you see that as well?"

"O-oh, yes, sir... I, uh... yes."

"Well then, I had another question when I started wondering whether you were Envy. Why ARE you talking to me now? If Envy wanted to take you along, it would have taken you and not told you all its plans and all the other information and then let you come here and tell me all about them."

"Uh... I don't know, sir. It said something about... that it was going to Central and that it was irrelevant whether you knew about that or not."

"Seriously? It's trying to mislead us with that simple a lie?"

"S-sir?"

"There is no reason why it would have told it is going to Central unless it was trying to mislead us. Otherwise it would just not mention it. Therefore, it must be going somewhere else, probably East City, since that is where Mustang's base of operations is."

"Oh..."

"Did it leave already?"

"No, sir... It asked me to come with it."

"What did you reply?"

"Nothing yet, sir."

"You'll meet it again then at some point?"

"Yes, sir. But it specifically said that it would find me so I have no idea when or where it's going to happen."

"At times like these, I wish it was as dim as it usually appears. All right, if you don't go with it, it will go alone and we have no way of tracking it. If you go with it, we can track you, since you're recognisable. Also, there is a possibility you can report to us of its doings. Therefore, it is better if you go with it."

"Y-yes, sir."

"Do you know what are the duties and responsibilities of a secret field intelligence agent?"

"Yes, sir."

"Tell me, then. I want to make sure you're up to date on that."

"Um, they should gather intelligence by any means necessary but without alerting anybody to their actions. They can kill enemies without repercussions and suspected traitors with minimal repercussions. They have to keep themselves secret even if lives were in danger, especially if their being discovered would ruin their work."

"Yes. You can act as a secret field intelligence agent now. Don't kill anyone, though Envy you can kill if you get the chance. I recommend not doing anything illegal. If people's lives are in danger, you can reveal both yourself and Envy. And if Envy finds out you're spying on it, promise it not to do that so you can travel with it, if possible. Even if you couldn't send any information, you're better there watching and controlling it."

Shrike had no idea how he could possibly control Envy, but the mission itself seemed so impossible that he was only thinking of how he could even survive. "Y-yes, sir. How can I contact you?"

"Do you know the military message code?"

"Yes... but I doubt it will help with Envy, since it also knows the military message code and would probably guess the codewords. And even if I could write with it not seeing, how could I get the messages sent without it getting suspicious?"

"The code would act against the common people, but you're right that you would also need to hide your doings carefully from Envy."

"Hm..." Shrike thought quietly for a moment, and apparently so did Armstrong, since she also said nothing. "Sir, my best idea is that I'll just be as helpful and non-suspicious for as long as it takes for Envy to not care that much about what I do. I guess then I would be able to send letters more freely."

"Hm, I agree."

"Where do I send the letters, sir?"

"Are you the only person who has access to your place of residence?"

"No, my father also lives there a few days per year. But he's in a travelling military unit, he'll understand the need to keep a secret. But he'll probably be on a mission for at least... three more months from now, that's what he said."

"Good. What is your father's name?"

"Shannon Shrike, sir."

"Do you normally send any letters to your father?"

"Um... very rarely until lately, but yes."

"Good. Send your information in letters addressed to your father. Hm... What is your mother's name?"

"Sir?"

"Just answer."

"Katherine Shrike."

"Katherine... Karine. That looks like your name. Listen, just in case Envy finds out you're sending letters and starts taking part in writing them... Sign the letters with 'Karine Shrike' if Envy didn't take part in writing them. If it did take part in writing them, sign them with your own name."

"But what if it finds out about that too?"

"I don't know, if you have a better idea than having a backup system for a backup system of a backup system and so on, do tell me. With the military code and codewords and everything, this is already so complex that it's close to beating its purpose."

"Er, yes, sir."

"One of my people will intercept and read the letters. I'll have Major Rodney telephone you tomorrow morning to give the codewords. After you've received the codewords, give the key of your place of residence to First Lieutenant Toldi along with any technical instructions concerning it."

"Yes, sir."

"That's all. Do you have anything else to say?"

"No, sir."

"Good luck, then."

"Thank you."

Shrike hung up the phone and spent a moment staring at the wall while his thoughts broke down into uncountable fragments. He had to spend quite a while gathering them and calming himself from the sudden armed assault. At least he had not completely frozen up, even if the circumstances had been extraordinarily unexpected. After some time, a guard came to ask him to leave. He did so and went to his room to think.

Once Shrike got mostly over his shock, he managed to contemplate about some practical issues. He thought that he still needed his key, so he decided it would be best to make a copy of it. He considered using the military's workshops, but they were in another area than the barracks, so he decided to look for a piece of metal and duplicate the key by using alchemy. He went and salvaged a small clod of metal off of a broken chair he found in the furniture trash. He spent quite some time getting the key right; it was surprisingly difficult to mould the key to be exactly like the original. Even then, Shrike could not be entirely sure if he had succeeded.

In the morning, Shrike received a call from Rodney who gave him the codewords. After that, he took his original key to Toldi and kept the one he had made with alchemy. Along with the key, he gave Toldi instructions to not turn on the power or the heating in the flat.

He then spent the whole day going over the couple of alchemy books he had borrowed and returned them to the library toward the evening. He walked around looking for issues that he could solve with alchemy since he thought it was good practice even if he did not need to find Envy any longer. He saw no trace of Envy.

The next day, Shrike spent some time in military exercises in the headquarters and then went to the library to read. Again, he caught no glimpse of Envy.

* * *

One more day later, Shrike was walking around the city and planning to go to his flat to sleep for the next night. Since he effectively had nothing to do, he ended up looking for people to help and managed to melt some more snow and fix a couple of dented vehicles.

Then Envy finally appeared and pulled him to the side again. It looked like a different person now, but had mostly the same clothing.

"So, you're going to come with me, right?"

"Yeah."

"Good. You can leave right now, can't you?"

"Right now? But I should take this bag back home first..."

"Why? What's in it?"

"Well, an alchemy book and some personal hygiene stuff... you know, maybe I don't need to take it back."

"Yeah. Well, let's go. I got you some equipment and extra clothes and stuff. I even got some food because you can't just eat trees."

"Um, that's uh, great. Wait... How could you buy clothes for me?"

"You humans use this arbitrary concept of money to exchange items of value..."

"Er, I meant, how did you know what fits me?"

"Shrike! I'm a shapeshifter and I know EXACTLY how you look like. And even if I for some inexplicable reason got something wrong, you can make the clothes fit by modifying them with your alchemy."

"O-oh, right."

"Let's go then." Envy started walking and Shrike followed it.

They walked for a long time, mostly in silence. They passed the city centre, took a deroute to another side of the city, walked along a deserted road toward the western forests and eventually just walked into the forest. Not too far away, Envy dug up a small stash of stuff from the snow.

"Okay, let's start skiing."

"Skiing?"

"That's how we're going to go to Central."

"What? Not by train?"

"No! Why would we do that? I admit I'll be frustrated with your pace but it's just better this way. No one will see us and no one will see you. Don't worry, you can sleep enough and I even got a tent and everything." It showed a "portable" stove that probably was not meant to be portable, but since Envy could lift it, it was portable enough. "I don't have firewood but you can transmute that from these trees, right?"

"Errr... Yes, I think so."

"You can even transmute some warm washing water for yourself from all this snow. That's how your special little thermal energy transmutation works, right?"

"Um, yes." Shrike looked at the stove and thought that he would probably be able to cook food with his alchemy as well, rendering the stove useless. He then realised that it would probably serve as a heater when he was sleeping and not able to perform alchemy.

"Good. So, do you have any other troubles or shall we go?"

"Uhh... Wait, we're actually going to Central?"

"Yeah?"

"I thought you just said that to mislead Armstrong. I mean, you said yourself that I'd go ask Armstrong's permission..."

Envy chuckled. "You know what? I just honestly thought it wouldn't make any difference whether she knew where I was going. But if she now thinks I'll go to East City or something, well, bonus! Ha ha!"

"Uh."

"Heh. Anything else?"

"No, I don't think so..."

"Finally! Here you go." Envy gave Shrike a pair of skis and ski poles. "Can you carry this?" It gave him a somewhat large travelling backpack. It did not weigh very much.

"I think so."

"Good. Carry that and give me that bag of yours." Envy took Shrike's bag and placed it with the rest of the equipment it had in a pulk that it would pull. "Let's go. We'll stop when you need to stop, and that's all."

Save for some drinking breaks, they skied in silence until the night fell.

"Can we stop now?" asked Shrike.

"Sure, if you're tired."

"Well... it's dark."

"That's not an issue. If you're not hurting or don't need to eat, sleep or pee or something, there's no reason to stop. I can see well enough in the dark and you can just follow me."

"Oh... Well, I'll just pee then." Shrike went a bit further and once he was done, he had another question. "But what about the wild animals? I think there are some in these parts."

"They are also not an issue. Animals stay away from me."

"They do? How come?"

Envy started skiing again. "I don't know. They just don't like homunculi."

"Huh. Well, that's pretty convenient."

"Yeah, except when I run into them. Watch out, there's a lynx behind you."

"What?!" Shrike turned around quickly, but of course he saw nothing in the darkness.

"Relax, I'll catch it. Lynxes aren't particularly dangerous to humans anyway." Envy stretched its arm out of its clothing, separated it into two large arms and used them to catch and kill the lynx. At the same time, it had stretched its other arm to the opposite direction and enlarged it as well to use it as a counterbalance. Shrike looked at the killing wide-eyedly and was rather horrified.

Once Envy had killed the lynx, it dragged the body toward itself and started eating it. Envy was being very neat about it because it did not like being messy with blood and entrails and because it needed to compress the carcass inside its body in a similar manner as its own body. Shrike just watched and did not know whether to feel very nauseated or slightly impressed. He eventually settled for nausea.

"Are you done staring?" asked Envy once it was done with eating and had cleaned up some blood stains and collected the few things it had dropped to catch the lynx.

"E-er... yes... That was uh... disturbing."

Envy just tilted its head at Shrike and started skiing again.

As the night progressed, Shrike eventually became too tired to continue. Envy set up the tent while Shrike transmuted some firewood for the portable stove. Envy set up the stove and Shrike settled to sleep. While he slept, Envy kept the fire on and read Shrike's alchemy book. It did not bother to change out of its current form since the clothing it had fit that form.

Once Shrike started waking up, Envy dug out some new clothes for him to wear.

Shrike looked at them in confusion. "These are women's clothes."

The pile of clothes included a light brown double-breasted jacket with a belt, green cardigan, light blue blouse, white undershirt, soft beige pantyhose, brown femininely cut trousers, calf-high boots, white delicate gloves and a light knit winter hat with decorations. There were also a few other articles of clothing, though he was not supposed to wear them all at once.

"Yep. You can't shapeshift, so you need to disguise. I don't want people to know where I am and therefore I don't want people to know where you are, and changing your presented sex is by far the easiest way to do that for whatever odd human reason. You know, I wouldn't have even noticed that if I hadn't followed some human infiltrators once. And I wouldn't have noticed that humans didn't notice that they weren't the same if they hadn't commented on that too and if I hadn't seen how they completely eluded identification! It was ridiculous, seriously."

"But... we're in the middle of a forest so no one will see us either way."

"That's why I'm giving you the clothes now so you can get used to them."

"I won't get used to them!"

"You totally will."

"How can you say that?"

"I got used to CLOTHES. Even if I still don't like wearing them all that much."

"But they're women's clothes!"

"So what! I present myself as androgynous and you apparently still love me and that didn't cause problems to your brain even when some people in Briggs started thinking that you were a homosexual. Wait, does the problem have something to do with your image or something? Are you afraid wearing women's clothes would make you too feminine? Or that you might like it or something?"

"Uh..."

"All of the above?"

"Um..."

"Shrike, seriously. They're not clothes that you wanted or picked. I picked them. They don't magically change you into a woman! And even if they did, you'd then magically change into a man when you wore men's clothes again! Geez!"

"But how could I even pass for a woman?"

"It's really not that hard. I've said this before, but Massena is more masculine than you and she's still clearly enough a woman. The only real problem is your voice, but if you speak softly and quietly, no one will pay attention to that either."

"But – –"

"Shrike, shut up! I'm a shapeshifter and I've been bored enough to test this kind of stupid stuff! It will work well enough and I assure you that your precious little masculine psyche, whatever that is, is safe. Wearing women's clothes will affect you only if you want it to. They're just bloody clothes that you didn't even choose."

"Uh."

Envy stared angrily at Shrike until he gave in and put on the clothes. He was obviously mentally uncomfortable, but physically not too much.

"That wasn't so bad, now was it? You look nice enough."

Shrike was rather blushed. "I have a hard time believing that," he said with a small voice.

"Hey, that even sounded like a woman! Good job!"

Shrike sighed in frustration. "I don't even have breasts... well, false breasts, that is."

"You'll apparently be surprised to find out how little that matters. Do you remember how many people started thinking that I was a woman? And the ONLY thing that gave them a different clue was that I stared being a little 'closer' to you. My own form looks more masculine than you now."

"You're not making me feel any better about this."

"So? Anyway, you're rather thin and that won't change even if you present yourself as a woman instead of a man. Thin women don't tend to have much breasts. Your pectoral muscles make do just fine."

"Uhh."

"And remember to shave well and whatever. But apparently you don't really have a problem with that. I don't remember seeing any stubble on you."

"Er, yeah."

"Okay. Hungry?" Envy dug out some dried food for Shrike who then transmuted some snow into water and ate. Envy ate a little as well.

They started skiing again. During the day, Envy came to find that it was positively surprised, even if only a little, because Shrike could ski for a longer time than it had thought, even if his speed was still quite slow. Shrike seemed small and weak and while he was a very bad fighter, he had endurance to keep moving.

As Envy had said, Shrike indeed grew used to wearing women's clothes, and after a week, he did not even complain about them any longer.


	14. Investigation

**Author's note:** With respect to the previous chapter, I changed the first conversation between Envy and Shrike and added a bit about the clothes at the end.

* * *

It took Envy and Shrike two weeks to make their way into Central City's vicinity because of their winding route. They visited two towns between North City and Central but did not do much anything in them. Envy merely stole some money without even telling Shrike about it.

When they finally arrived in the city, Envy gave Shrike money and told him to sign into a hotel. It figured that since jumping right into the enemy's hands was not a good idea, a better course of action would be to observe the soldiers and find out which ones of them would be easy to impersonate. Envy was too impatient to do that, but now Shrike was there and it could make him observe them. It told him to sit at a café near the recently rebuilt Central military headquarters and mark down the appearance and times of coming and going of any military personnel he could identify.

Meanwhile, Envy went into the sewers and located a nearby hideout where it could store its items. For the moment, it had no better plan than to comb through the extensive hideouts in the sewers under Central. It needed to wait for Shrike's information before it could do anything more forward.

Shrike soon found out that he passed for a woman just fine, as Envy had said. Even his voice did not rouse questions, though he of course tried his best to talk quietly and with a slightly higher pitch. After a couple of days, he wrote a letter to Briggs and sent it to his father. In it, he only explained where he and Envy were, what they had done and what Envy was doing now.

Once, when Envy was walking on a street in Central, it suddenly came across a Xingese person, and on that instant it remembered that the Xingese could sense its Philosopher's Stone and tell it apart from other people. It froze and stared at the Xingese person in shock, but the middle-aged Xingese man just walked by it as if there was nothing wrong.

Envy was very confused and wondered why he had not noticed it. It first thought that perhaps its Stone was too depleted, but after some examination, it concluded once again that it did still have enough souls to seem suspicious, at least as far as it knew. Then it figured out that it was possible that not all Xingese people would be able to sense its uniqueness. While that alleviated it for now, it had no idea which Xingese could tell it apart and which could not, and that frustrated it.

Shrike kept following the military people as they went by. He switched cafés sometimes and occasionally sat inside the café and occasionally outside, depending on the weather.

He was halfway writing another person's description when he started thinking that there was something suspiciously familiar about the figure. He looked more closely, and as the soldier turned, Shrike met his eyes and saw that it was his father, Shannon Shrike.

Shrike just saw his father's expression turning more confused before he blushed terribly, turned his eyes away and tried to hide his face in the notebook he had been writing in. What if his father had recognised him? He had no idea how to explain any of what was going on and most of all, why he was wearing women's clothes.

Shrike kept his face very close to the notebook, but he could tell that his father soon arrived next to him.

Shannon Shrike just stood there for a moment, but then he bent down. "Um, Kaine?" he whispered quietly.

"U-uh-uh..." mumbled Shrike and still did not look at him.

"Er... Why are you wearing women's clothing? Why are you here?"

"I'm... I'm uh... s-s-no... I'm, um, in disguise," he mumbled very quietly.

"Oh... oh. I understand. I've um, done something like that myself. So... sorry, carry on," he said and walked away.

Shrike blushed even more as he could not help imagining his father wearing women's clothing now, even if he had not actually even implied it. It took him a long while until he got his brain organised enough to continue watching people, and even then he kept losing his concentration because there was too little for him to concentrate on.

Some men occasionally tried to talk to Shrike, but he did not talk back at them or barely answered with one word which was usually "no". However, one morning as he came to his usual table, he saw a little note on it. It was addressed "to the cute grey-haired lady with glasses". Shrike blushed but naturally had to read the rest of the note. It said:

"I would very much like to meet you. Please be here tomorrow at five in the evening!"

Shrike grew very anxious. He certainly did not want to be there to meet whoever it was who wanted to meet him.

Shrike complained about it to Envy once they met the next morning, somewhat close to the hotel where Shrike was staying.

"I can't believe this. I got some stupid note from some awful stalker who wants to meet me. Look at this." Shrike waved the note at Envy.

Envy took the note and read it. "See, you shouldn't have ever worried about passing as a woman." It gave the note back.

"What? What's that got to with... ugh! What am I going to do? I don't want to meet him! Who knows what he wants?"

"Then don't meet him! Though... is he with the military?"

"How should I know?"

"Well meet him and find out. If he isn't, just say that you're not interested. If he is, play along for a while and ask him some questions. Say that you were last in Central during the eclipse and you'd like him to tell what happened after that and ask all about how the headquarters was rebuilt and so on, you know."

"What? I can't do that..."

"Sure you can! You're shy normally and painfully more so as a woman, so you can be as socially awkward as you like."

"But... I don't... I haven't even dated a woman before, or anyone! How should I know what I should do?"

"You don't! Seriously, no one is born with that kind of knowledge. If you feel so darned anxious about it, say that to HIM. He'll probably be sympathetic!"

"C-can you tell me how I should act?"

"I can, but why would I? Every human is different and the most awful scenes just occur if you try to put on a charade that doesn't fit you. You're already troubled enough playing a woman so adding even more lie to that would just make the whole thing explode on your face. You're best off being as much like yourself. Just be as unsure as ever and you'll be fine!"

"Oh..."

"Well then, get going. I'm going to cover another stupid empty and abandoned tunnel system over there," said Envy and left.

Somewhat disheartened, Shrike went on his way and arrived at his usual spot. He spent nearly the whole day worrying about his predicament and wishing that the man was not a soldier.

When it was finally time for Shrike's mystery man to appear, a man in a military uniform approached him and Shrike cursed at himself. He felt horrified.

"Hello! I am glad you agreed to meet me," he said. "I was a bit worried that you wouldn't, since I tried to talk to you before but you didn't reply."

Shrike thought that the man seemed quite tense and reserved himself and was just posturing as self-confident. "Yes... uh, hello."

"I'm Roger Brendan, a Sergeant Major in the military. Can I ask your name?"

"It's Maria Thell."

"Pleased to meet you. Um... Would you like a cup of tea?" Shrike nodded. "Red tea? All right, wait a moment, I'll go buy some."

The man went to the café's counter and bought two cups of tea. He gave the other one to Shrike when he returned.

Shrike managed to start his so-called interrogation. "So, uh... what do you do in the army?"

Brendan told Shrike pretty much everything he wanted to know, but did not share any issues that were obviously secret, and overall everything he said sounded rather vague. Shrike thought that his uniform was slightly dishevelled.

Shrike met him the next day as well.

* * *

Shrike woke up in some bed with a throbbing headache. He stared at the ceiling and it did not look familiar. He did not have his glasses on either. He realised he had no idea where he was, and the panic settled in. There was something heavy on his stomach and he soon found out that it was an arm, but he was sure that it was not Envy's arm, and besides, Envy never left its body parts on him even when they had slept close to each other in the tent. He squirmed out from under the arm, sat up and instantly felt light-headed. The headache got worse and he had to struggle to not throw up.

He had his socks, top and opened cardigan on, but he was otherwise naked. He grew terrified. He looked at the person whose arm he had just pushed off himself. It was Brendan, and he was sleeping and also naked save for a casual shirt. He looked rather red in the face.

Blood escaped from Shrike's brain as he tried to parse together how in the world he had ended up in this situation. He did not remember much from yesterday, only that he had watched the military people like previously and that he had met Brendan.

If he was in bed with Brendan with both of them naked, did that mean they had had sex? How could they have? Shrike did not feel like he had had sex in any way, but he could not be sure of it. And if he was now naked, Brendan must have found out that he had just been dressed as a woman. The thought of that made Shrike incredibly ashamed. He felt nauseous and sore all over, but he did not remember drinking or eating anything suspicious even though that was the only thing that would explain his physical state. And that would mean Brendan had drugged him.

Terrified, Shrike crawled out of the bed and looked around. The room seemed to be a hotel room. The rest of his clothes were on the floor, and the first thing he did was to pick up his underpants and pull them on. While he did that, he became so nauseated that he had to give up and run straight for the toilet to throw up. It made him even sicker since there was actually nothing in his stomach that he could get rid of.

He panted in the bathroom for a while and managed to stop retching. He started feeling considerably better after he had cleaned his mouth. When he stopped, the horrible realisation dawned on him that Brendan might have woken up because of all the noise he had been making.

Shrike could hear some breathing from the bathroom's doorway. He quickly turned his completely pale face at Brendan but remembered that he was still almost naked from waist down and managed to not turn his body toward the other man. Brendan had pulled his military uniform trousers on, but they were in disarray and looked odd. Now Shrike noticed that the shirt Brendan had was not a standard military shirt.

"Are you clear now? Huh?!" he asked. Shrike could not reply. "What kind of joke is this? Why were you dressed as a woman? Why did you trick me?!"

Shrike could not believe what he was hearing. Brendan was blaming him for trickery while Brendan had been the one to drug him. Shrike did not want to listen. He wanted out of the situation right now, but Brendan was in the doorway. Shrike turned his eyes away from Brendan and started talking back at him. "What?! You... it's all your fault! I don't remember anything about yesterday! Did you drug me or what?"

"Why did you trick me?" he shouted.

"It's your fault! I didn't want to meet you!"

"Why didn't you tell me to go away then?"

"I didn't want you to... Just go away!"

"I'm going to beat you up!" Shrike was frightened, but he could easily evade the man's lousy attempt at hitting. Brendan stumbled forward and fell down, only barely managing to grab a hold of the toilet seat and not smash his head against it. Shrike ran out of the bathroom and back into the hotel room. He started digging through his bag.

Shrike found his pistol just in time and pointed it at Brendan when he came out from the bathroom.

"What?!" Brendan was obviously alarmed, but he also looked like he could not believe his eyes. "What kind of freak of a cross-dresser has a gun? That must be a fake! You can't even use it!"

Shrike pulled the bullet chamber off for a second, put it back and then took the safety off of the gun. He was still aiming at Brendan, though he kept squinting since his vision was a little blurry without his glasses. He guessed that having been drugged made his vision even blurrier at the moment.

"What did you do?!"

Shrike looked at him in a confused manner. He could not believe that the man did not seem to know what he had just done with the pistol. "I showed you that I can use this pistol, that I have ammunition and that the safety is off."

"You're lying!"

"You're a liar! You're not a soldier! Now stay where you are!" Shrike glared at the man who did not dare to move at the moment. He then glanced at the floor and started slowly gathering his clothes and other items on the bed. He saw that there was a considerable pile of beer bottles on the floor on Brendan's side of the bed.

"Why were you dressed as a woman?" repeated Brendan.

"Why did you drug me?" shouted Shrike angrily. "That's wrong and illegal! I could just shoot you now without another thought and no one would care because it would be self defence!"

"Yeah but why are you wearing women's clothes?!"

"Shut! Up! Screw you!" Shrike spotted a pen on the desk of the hotel room. "Go into the bathroom!"

"But – –"

"Shut up! Into the bathroom!"

"But – –"

"IN!" Shrike fake-darted at Brendan while waving his pistol at the man. He also grabbed the pen.

Brendan went into the bathroom and was obviously very unwilling to do so, but he seemed to be afraid of the gun.

Shrike grabbed the bathroom's door and pushed it closed. He then started drawing a transmutation circle on the wall right next to it, but Brendan slammed the door open, hitting Shrike's shoulder with it.

"You're not locking me in here!" shouted Brendan and came at Shrike. He obviously tried to do some violence, but even Shrike could see what he was doing. Shrike stepped to the side and Brendan ran straight into a closet door and could not even stop his awkward lunge with his hands. He smashed his head on it and then stumbled backwards. "Agh!"

Shrike used the opportunity and smashed the man's jaw with the bottom of his pistol. Brendan took the hit and fell down on the bathroom floor, hitting his cheek on the sink. He then stayed on the floor.

Shrike was still agitated, but after a short moment, he grew worried enough to wonder whether Brendan was still alive. He poked Brendan with his foot and when the man did not stir, Shrike knelt down to check that he had not died. Brendan was indeed still breathing.

Shrike left him there and went to put on his clothes. He left all of Brendan's items untouched, though he looked at his uniform jacket and noticed that it was a fake. Outwardly, it looked quite a lot like a real uniform, but the inner side was obviously different and of inferior quality.

Shrike gathered all his things and left. He was glad that the nausea had significantly decreased, even if it still was not over, and his head still hurt. He seemed to be on the third floor. He made his way down and hoped that nobody would pay attention to him, and luckily no one did.

Once outside, he noticed that he was relatively close to the hotel he was actually staying at. It was already half an hour past the time that he should have met Envy, so he quickly made his way to the spot.

"Where were you?!" asked Envy once he had found it. "And you look really bad, too. What the heck happened?"

"Uh... That... that man you wanted me to question drugged me and took me to a hotel and uh..."

Now Envy looked thunderstruck. "WHAT?" Shrike did not reply. "He... what? Drugged you and...? He must have tried to have sex with you! Did he find out you're a man?"

"Well, yes."

"Crap! Where is he?"

"Um... It was a hotel, uh, there..."

"This whole area is full of hotels! Didn't you even note down the name?"

"Um... no."

"Argh! Darnit! Eh, I guess we'll have to redisguise you. Some different style of clothing..."

"Can I stop being a woman now?"

"Nooo! Hm, ditch the glasses, those are kind of a clear giveaway."

"But I can't see too well without them."

"You can still see, right?"

"Well, yes, but not any details... I wouldn't be able to watch the soldiers coming and going."

Envy sighed. "Fine, I'll get some new glasses made for you. Go get your stuff out of that hotel of yours, you can sit around in my hideout for a day or two."

"Uh, okay."

Shrike went to his hotel, got all his things and signed out of the hotel. After that, Envy led him through the sewers into a small and rather well-hidden hideout that it had been using to store its equipment. Once they got there, Envy unloaded all of the gear it was currently carrying as well as the clothes it was wearing.

"Okay, I'll go get some glasses for you first, then I'll come back with those and some food and water and after that I'll go get you a new set of clothes. Hm, maybe I ought to plan your new style now while you still have that getup on and it's easy to compare. Well, you can't be very conspicuous, but maybe instead of that unimpressiveness, you could be snobby. And now you don't need to ski." Envy looked at Shrike in an assessing manner and then shapeshifted into another version of him, with a set of rather expensive clothes on.

Shrike looked disturbed. Envy changed the clothing a few more times until it settled for a fur coat, dress, very feminine boots and a somewhat ridiculous fur hat that was in fashion this winter.

"Envy... Please, no. That's... that's awful."

"You know what? I agree. But I do know that the stupid humans up there think this is a neat and fashionable getup. So this is what you're going to get. If I find something less obscene in the store, I'll buy that instead."

Shrike sighed hopelessly and leaned on the wall. "Please... Isn't the info I've gotten so far enough?"

"Hm. Well, I guess this would be good enough, but you still need a new disguise. You got used to those clothes, you'll get used to the new ones too. Give me those glasses. I can get the same kind of pair with a different frame just like that, right?"

"Er, yes... But you don't need really need these either. They're regular minus two point one lenses."

"So I'll get what you need if I ask for minus two point one glasses?"

"Yeah."

"Okay. Well, wait here. I'll be back soon."

Envy's trip to the glasses shop was very uneventful. Likewise, it did not run into trouble while getting Shrike a small stash of food and water. It then went back into the sewers and brought the items to Shrike.

When it exited the sewers again and had just set the lid on the sewer hole, it noticed that two people were watching it and their body language screamed of fighting.

One of them was Xingese. He was dressed in a getup somewhat similar to what the annoying ninja girl from three years back had worn, but he had no mask, the clothing was much more plain and not too foreign-looking and he had some winter gear on.

"That's the one," he said quietly and with an obvious accent.

"In that case, DIE, MONSTER!" screamed the other person, an Amestrian woman with messy brown hair, a really worn face and a fit body but beaten posture. She lifted her hand, and Envy could see that there was a transmutation circle drawn on it. She slammed the hand on the ground and a row of sharp spikes emerged from the pavement.

Envy could not believe how it had gotten into a mess like this again. Another alchemist who wanted to harm it and now also to kill it?

Envy only barely evaded the spikes by jumping on a fire ladder that creaked and was nearly torn off of its place by its weight. "I don't have time for this idiotic play!" it shouted at her.

The Xingese person pulled a portable machine gun from under his winter coat and started shooting at Envy. Luckily for Envy, he was clearly not very good with the weapon. Only a few bullets hit Envy, and since they were for some reason armour-piercing and non-explosive, they did not cause all that much damage to Envy. Envy just tried to let them pass through its body as harmlessly as possible.

The alchemist tried again and this time transmuted the wall of the building, forming similar spikes as with the ground. A couple of spikes managed to perforate Envy before it could leap out of their way and at the alchemist. The alchemist suddenly stopped when she heard a suspicious crack from the brick building she had just transmuted.

Envy ran at the woman and ignored the gunfire from the Xingese man. She tried to transmute the ground again, but this time Envy just jumped upward and out of the way. Envy ran almost to the woman's arm's reach, but just before that, it stopped, shapeshifted its arm longer and struck her on the mouth with it. She tried to evade and managed to sidestep most of the force but she still fell down, stunned and bleeding.

The Xingese man kept trying to fire at Envy, but he was failing delightfully. "It doesn't shoot!" he shouted.

"Eject the empty magazine!" said the alchemist from the ground.

Envy tried to smack the Xingese person senseless as well, but it was obvious he was much better at close combat than firing a gun. He blocked Envy's hitting attempt easily, using the gun to deflect the blow. Envy wanted to try hitting him again but it was too slow. He started instead hitting it with quick and relentless strikes.

"Screw you and your stupid country!" shouted Envy at him and shapeshifted its arm so large that there was no way he could evade it when it pushed and smacked him against the wall.

However, during that time, the alchemist had gotten up and how slapped her other hand on Envy. Envy screamed in pain as a part of its body disintegrated, and it took a few steps back while waving at the woman with its large arm to keep her away.

"Who the hell are you?!" it shouted as it shapeshifted its hand back to normal and withdrew it so as to not let her touch it and disintegrate it as well.

"You don't know?!" she shouted back, apparently extremely hurt. She was staying still momentarily since she was too close to transmute without Envy managing to intercept. Similarly, Envy was at an awkward position where both attacking and fleeing would allow its two opponents to retaliate.

"No! I haven't even seen you before!"

"Colonel Sannah Ehrhardt!"

"Who?"

"You...! It doesn't matter! You're one of those horrible monsters who caused the trouble at Central headquarters two years ago and started the Ishval Civil War and the incident in Reole and who knows what else! I don't know how you managed to survive, but this is as far as you'll get! You killed all of my family!"

Envy could not help but grin now, though it still had no idea what the woman was talking about and how she could know that the homunculi had been behind most of the incidents around the country since Mustang and the other high-ranks had decided to hide the real state of things. "Oh yeah? Which year was that?"

The alchemist looked extremely angry. "You despicable monster! Don't belittle me!"

Envy thought that now she was practically asking for it. "You're insignificant and so is your non-existent family!"

"Die!"

Envy scoffed at Ehrhardt and stretched its arm at the alchemist at the same time as she lunged down, ready to transmute some spikes again. The Xingese person had drawn a sword and was now preparing to strike. Envy thought that it would not get its arm past the two to harm the woman without losing the appendage, so it stopped extending its arm and instead jumped on the fire ladder again and barely managed to manoeuvre itself out of the spikes' way. The lowest part of the fire ladder came down and Envy fell on the ground.

Envy glanced behind itself and saw that a few people were watching it as well as its enemies. It did not want to stick around until even more people and soldiers would come around. It evaded the additional spikes coming its way by darting at the alchemist and Xingese person and leaped over them.

"Suwahao! The gun!" shouted Ehrhardt. The Xingese person who apparently was called Suwahao picked up the portable machine gun to shoot at Envy, but it was still out of ammo.

Envy landed close to the corner of the street, breaking the pavement under it as it landed. It darted off and just as it turned around the corner, it shapeshifted into a much smaller human than it had just a moment ago been. It made its way quickly through the streets and changed its appearance twice more to throw possible followers off its trail. Then it finally entered another sewer hole and went so deep that it figured that the Xingese person could not sense it.

Envy felt very irritated. Apparently it now had some Xingese person and a vengeful alchemist hunting it and it did not even know why. It could not figure out how it could have pissed off any Xingese people since it had not even managed to kill the ninja girl, whatever her name had been. Envy felt bitter about not having been able to kill her. And how could that alchemist Colonel Sannah Ehrhardt have assumed that it had killed all of her family? Of course, if her whole family had been just one or two people, it would be much more likely. What Envy could not understand was how she could have known that precisely it had killed her family. Of course, she could have meant that the killer was any of the other homunculi and she was just taking her revenge on the one she knew was alive. Even then the one who had killed her family was most likely to have been either it or Lust or Gluttony who had often been with Envy. And before just that one year before the Promised Day, they had never left alive anyone who had seen how they truly looked. The whole thing made no sense to Envy and it hated that.

Envy did not want to dwell on the issue any longer. It made its way through the sewers and secret tunnels. Some of the tunnels had been sealed, but Envy just took another route around them. It finally emerged on the other side of the city. It looked for a clothes shop and first bought new clothes for itself. It was glad of the dullness of the shop. It also bought a bag for the clothes and then went and hid the bag in a sewer tunnel close by. After that, it realised that it did not have enough money to buy the expensive clothes for Shrike that it had planned on buying. It sighed and searched an expensive looking hotel nearby. Once it found one, it waited until a rich-looking couple went in and followed them. It stalked them to get their room number, also got a room for itself and then followed the couple discreetly.

It planned on waiting until the couple would leave, and luckily they merely dropped their baggage in the room and left after that. After they had left, Envy went to the door of their room, picked the lock and entered the room. It spent a short while going through their luggage until it found some money. It glared at the amount of the stuff and settled for taking just a part of the money since it had no use for so much money and it did not believe it would require any more. It then left the room, closed the door and relocked it. It dropped the key to its own room into the trash.

Envy left the hotel, changed its shape so that it was a woman of Shrike's size but otherwise not looking like him and went to buy the expensive clothes. Once it was done, it went into the sewers again and made its way to where Shrike was.

It eventually arrived at the spot. Shrike had made a lamp of some kind and was writing something while reading his alchemy book. Envy just let the bags of clothing plop on the floor and then slid down along the wall and sighed deeply.

"Um?"

"Some stupid humans attacked me just outside the sewer when I left."

"What? Why?"

"I don't know, the woman said something about that I had killed her family. I couldn't even remember her.

"Uh... is it possible you killed her family?"

"Probably? There's no way I could know unless she listed the dates and places."

"But how could she even recognise you?"

Just before it spoke, Envy realised that it might not be a good idea to let anyone know that there were people who could recognise that it was a homunculus. After that it figured that Shrike had most likely meant that Envy was hard to recognise because it was a shapeshifter. "How should I know? It was really annoying. Hm, I just wonder how that woman knew about me and the other... stuff in the first place. Have you heard of a Colonel Sannah Ehrhardt?"

"Mhh... She was working in North City while I was there."

Envy looked inquiring. "Really?"

"Yeah, but I didn't really talk to her, I just saw her and her name plaque. I heard someone say she transferred to North City from Central a short while after the eclipse."

"Was she still there that day before we left?"

"Yeah, as far as I know. Oh, I talked to her really briefly just after I first met you in North City, she was, um, being a bit too nosy."

"Huh. How did she know how to come here after me?"

"Umm... Maybe you accidentally shapeshifted to look like whoever had killed her family?"

Envy stared at Shrike, stupefied at the ludicrousness of his idea, but refrained from laughing. It was better if he believed that instead of something else. "That's unlikely, but I have no better explanation. Wait, Ehrhardt was in North City? Did you know she's an alchemist?"

"What?" Shrike looked very surprised.

"Apparently not. I'd have asked you what her special state alchemist title was."

"Errr... I'm pretty sure she isn't a state alchemist. Otherwise I and the others in North City would've known about it."

"Oh? That's odd. But I guess it's possible that she's just a regular alchemist. Oh hey, if you became a state alchemist, what would your title be?"

"What? I have no idea... Isn't the Führer the one who gives those?"

"Yeah. Do you think they would stop that naming convention if they got rid of the position of führer?"

"I have no idea..."

"Well, what kind of name do you think you'd get? Or what would you like?"

"Um..." Shrike spent some time thinking. "Thermal Alchemist?"

Envy scoffed. "That sounds pretty boring."

"Yeah, but that's pretty much what I do."

"And you're pretty boring too! Maybe that would be fitting, yeah."

"...You think I'm boring?"

"Well sure. And I also think that's a positive trait, at least in this case."

Again, Shrike did not quite know whether he should be a little offended or slightly flattered. He was quiet for a moment and put his papers and book away while Envy loitered on the floor.

"Oh, I got an idea!" exclaimed Envy suddenly. "Ehrhardt has gone missing from the North City headquarters, right? Or if she hasn't, at least there will be some kind of investigation going on about that incident today. After all, there was some audience around and they definitely saw her. I could go up the Central headquarters and pose as an officer from North City who has come to check her files here. Ooh, they might ask for some papers. It's better if I actually have some. If I fake them with my powers, I could only show them but I couldn't hand them over... Okay, I'm going to go get some paper and ink and pens. Wait here, I'm going to need you."

Envy went off again and made its way through the sewers. It came up, located an office supply store and bought everything it needed. It then returned to Shrike.

"Okay. Come on, let me see your military papers."

Shrike dug out his papers and showed them to Envy.

"Hmm... Right. You can make forgeries of this stuff with alchemy, right?"

"Um..."

"Well, of course you can. Get to it, make me a form that says I'm Lieutenant Colonel Gregor Patton, a transfer paper that says I transferred from Central to North City just a day before that eclipse two years ago, and a mission assignment."

Shrike was pretty sure that doing forgeries was illegal, but he did not dare to defy Envy now and at least no one would be killed if he did this. No one would probably even know that he had made the forgeries.

Envy gave Shrike all the needed information. It could fake the signature of the secretary responsible for transfers on the transfer paper and duplicated the signature of the leader of North City's headquarters from Shrike's transfer paper. The identity it was using was one of its disguises in Central, which it thought would be the safest to use. Envy thought that the soldiers at Central's headquarters might notice that the person it was posing as had not been seen for those three years, but thanks to the transfer papers, it could say that it was not dead or missing but had only been transferred and all the paperwork had been destroyed in the attacks. The only problem was that no one else knew about the transfer, but then again, very few people had even seen this particular disguise. Nonetheless, there were people who had seen it, so it was possible that would work in its favour.

Once the forgeries were complete, Envy looked at them and was fairly satisfied.

Shrike, then again, felt still a little uncertain, but figured that there was nothing he could really do about it. He looked at Envy and wished that it looked like it normally did. He had not seen its preferred form for quite some time because it too was nearly always in disguise, making sure that there was no chance people could recognise it. It did not often bother to shapeshift even when it was alone with Shrike because it did not like dressing and undressing itself.

"Envy... could you shapeshift to look like you?"

"Hm? Why?"

"Well, you look better as yourself."

Envy smirked a little surprisedly at Shrike. It did like its preferred form the most, so it did not really have a reason to decline. It shapeshifted out of its clothes and settled its form on the androgynous teenager again.

Shrike smiled and spent quite a while just looking at it. Envy looked at him looking at it.

* * *

**Author's note:** I almost had Shannon Shrike refer to Kaine Shrike as "Shrike". Then I thought again. There's this one X-Files episode where Mulder says "Even my parents called me Mulder." I still laugh at it.


	15. Information

The next day, Envy made Shrike wear the clothes it had bought him. Shrike hated them.

Envy then read in the newspaper about the little incident between it and Ehrhardt and Suwahao. Fortunately no one seemed to have gotten anything right – the writer of the story assumed that it had been a violent showdown between members of different crime gangs and that apparently one of them had been an alchemist. Envy paid no more attention to the article. It prepared and walked up to Central headquarters in the afternoon. It got in without problems by displaying its papers.

Once inside, Envy found out that the headquarters had been rebuilt mostly like it had been before. There had been some changes, but apparently nothing major.

The assignment that Envy was supposed to do according to its papers was to go through the archives to check the information on Sannah Ehrhardt because she had gone missing and the leaders in North City needed to double check the content of her files.

A private led it to the archives where a clerk took down its information. Envy was a bit worried that they would check the information and come back to question about it or even arrest it. Still, it knew that checking archives because of things like this was not anything extraordinary, so it hoped they would not be too alarmed.

Another private working in the archives helped it locate the files concerning Sannah Ehrhardt. Envy read them and mostly looked for an excuse to peruse the files on the usage of the secret facilities or anything about the homunculi or chimeras, though it started thinking that if the high-ranks had decided to keep that secret, there would be absolutely nothing about it in the archives. Envy sighed at realising that.

Nonetheless, it also took notes of the information about Ehrhardt, since she would probably try to come after it again.

Ehrhardt had been born in 1875. She had lived close to Ishval and her parents had perished in the Ishval Civil war. Her husband had died in Central on the Promised Day under mysterious circumstances. Envy could not find any clue as to how she knew about the homunculi. The only thing it could come up with that she had been rather deep in the know from the beginning and that was why she had been told. She had been interested in alchemy since she had been a child and had wanted to become a state alchemist up until the Ishval Civil War. After that she had stopped all attempts to become a state alchemist, though she apparently had kept practising alchemy. Her speciality seemed to be mineral-related alchemy. Envy thought that was useless and scoffed.

Envy was almost done with Ehrhardt's files when two soldiers came to question it.

"Lieutenant Colonel Gregor Patton, is it?" asked the Second Lieutenant.

"Yes, what?" replied Envy.

"Would you care to explain how you're still alive, sir, and acting like nothing had happened?"

"What?" asked Envy, sounding insulted. "I suggest you take your slander and leave right now," it said hostilely, true to the character of the person it was imitating.

"Sir, there are no papers of you in the archives and the last note is that you went missing on the day of the eclipse two years ago."

"Your inferior bookkeeping is none of my business. Leave me be so I can finish my task."

"Do I really have to bother your superiors in North City about this, sir?"

If the man telephoned North City, Envy would certainly be revealed as an impostor. "Don't you dare. I've always done my job immaculately and this time will be no exception. If you have no paper trail here, it is certainly because of some deficiency on your part. Were the archives damaged on the day of the eclipse? Did some errand boy of a clerk die when part of the headquarters collapsed? I understand it might be too hard to grasp for you, but if any of that happened, the paperwork has been likely lost due to that and the error is right there."

The Second Lieutenant frowned. "...I see, sir."

"Is that enough? Here are my papers, feel free to copy them for your archives if you must. I will wait here. Now will you continue disturbing me or will you leave?" Envy gave its papers to the man and went back to the file.

The Second Lieutenant took the papers and left. Envy was worried that the man might telephone North City either way. It then said to the archives clerk that it needed material on the day of the eclipse to study what Ehrhardt and her husband had been doing during that time. Like it expected, it found nothing about Ehrhardt's husband since he had not been a soldier, but it did notice from the texts that during the aftermath, some heavily guarded trucks had been driven to either prisons or locations that Envy remembered were some kind of fortified hideouts. That could only have meant very dangerous prisoners and possibly the surviving chimeras. The important thing about that finding was that it gave Envy an idea.

If Mustang had captured Envy's homunculus child, it would most likely have been transported in a similarly heavily guarded truck. It was possible Mustang had done the transportation independently of the military and thus there would be no paper trail of it, or that the papers would not be in Central but in East City or possibly even North City, but Envy could only know that if it checked the issue. It went and looked for cargo manifests and transportation permits from the time around when Armstrong had driven it from Fort Briggs since that must have been around when Mustang's people found the homunculus.

To its great delight, Envy found two such transportations, one from North City to Central in the end of December and one from Central to East City in the beginning of January. The transportations seemed extremely promising to Envy. Their content had been recorded as "experimental weaponry".

Envy put the files back and then read something about Mustang's promotions. Apparently he had been promoted to Brigadier General last summer and had just a couple of months ago made it to Major General. Envy felt quite annoyed at that. What had HE done to get promotions just like that? Armstrong had not been promoted once. Likewise, Armstrong had not promoted Envy either during the two years it had been in Briggs. After a moment, it actually realised that it was being jealous and immediately hated itself for feeling envy over such a stupid and insignificant matter.

The Second Lieutenant who had questioned Envy returned and gave its papers back to it. "The issue has been cleared, sir."

Envy took the papers very impolitely. "About time," it muttered under its breath. "I'm done wasting my time here. Good day," it said very strenuously and walked away.

Envy made its way quickly toward the train station, but just before it, entered the sewers again and travelled its winding route to where Shrike was waiting.

"Start packing. We're leaving," it said to Shrike and shapeshifted, putting on the clothes it had bought for itself a while ago.

Shrike was surprised. "Right now?"

"Yeah. Hm, we don't need this or this or these..." Envy put aside their skis, the tent, the pulk and the stove.

"Where are we going?"

"To East City."

"How will we get there?"

"By train."

"But people will see us in there."

"I don't care right now. I just want to get there quickly. I think the homunculus I created is being held there."

"Where there? It's a pretty big city."

"I don't know, but I can worry about that later. Let's go. You carry that, I'll take the rest." Envy gave Shrike a large handbag and then picked up the rest of the things. They started walking through the tunnels again. "Let's pretend to be a married couple again, okay?"

"Uh. Envy... Does this mean that all that work I did following the military people was for nothing?"

"Huh? I guess it was then. Why, do you feel bad about that?"

"Um... Well, yes, yes I do. It was a waste of time and I hated being in there getting ogled at."

"Well, too bad."

"I'm not doing it again."

"You will if I tell you to."

"No, I won't."

Envy turned around and glared at Shrike. "Don't defy me!" it shouted. Shrike took a step back and seemed scared, but there was also something else in his expression that Envy could not quite place. It was probably defiance. "Was that clear enough for you?" Shrike did not reply, so Envy started moving again. Shrike followed.

"Will you kill me if I refuse?" asked Shrike after a while.

Envy did not reply. It really did not know whether it would. Shrike was pretty much the only human who liked it and killing him would feel like a tremendous waste of Envy's effort. Then Envy realised that it had not actually spent all that much effort on Shrike; the most it had done was pretty much tolerate him.

And yet Shrike still loved it, at least based on yesterday.

Envy frowned at the conflict of not caring about how some inferior human felt and not wanting to put unnecessary distance between itself and the only being it could call its friend at the moment.

"No," replied Envy eventually.

"Uh... you took quite a lot of time to come up with that..."

Envy huffed shallowly. "The answer should be well thought out then," it muttered.

"Uh-huh."

"Don't you believe me?" it asked and turned at Shrike again.

Shrike looked at the ground. "I don't know... maybe."

Envy looked at Shrike and knew what it should do now, based on its experiences with humans. It should apologise and reassure Shrike that it was not lying. But by now even Shrike would know that if Envy did that, it would seem massively fake, and Envy was not sure lying to the man would be a good option. For now, the whole of their relationship was still based on truth, however unvarnished that may have been. Envy grimaced but spoke nevertheless. "Fine, Shrike, I'm sorry, okay?" it said and sounded just as reluctant to say that as it felt. "I won't kill you, really. And if you seriously hated that watching so much, well, okay. Don't do it then. I guess it's enough that I know they don't have any silly secret handshakes and stuff."

Shrike slowly looked up at Envy. He was somewhat confused.

"Okay?"

Shrike made a small nod.

Envy turned around and continued making its way forward.

"Um, thank you," said Shrike after a while. Envy did not reply.

The two exited the sewers about one and a half kilometres away from the train station, near some hotel. They walked on the streets the rest of the way. Once they arrived, Envy bought them tickets on the night train to East City. They spent the remainder of the day before departure eating at nearby restaurants.

Envy had gotten them a private booth on the train. Shrike slept through the trip, though not particularly well as the noise and movement of the train kept waking him up. Envy did not bother to try sleeping and instead just pondered what it would do in East City.

Envy was not as familiar with the layout of East City's headquarters as it was with Central's, and it did not want to try its investigation trick again. It thought of hiding in a truck going into the headquarters, but then it remembered that the sewers and tunnels under East City went remarkably close to the headquarters building. It was sure there would not be a direct route from the tunnels into the building, but Shrike could transmute a wider way in. Then it would only need to hide from the patrols, make its way to the archives and peruse them, and hopefully there would be a report corresponding to the ones in Central and Envy could figure out where the new homunculus had been taken.

* * *

The train arrived early in the morning and Envy and Shrike got off. After they and particularly Shrike had had something to eat and had bought some snack for Shrike, they made their way straight into the sewers. Envy remembered where the headquarters were approximately, so they just made their way toward the spot slowly. Occasionally, Envy reached an appendage equipped with an eye out of the sewers to check their location.

Envy shared its plan with Shrike as they travelled. Shrike did not seem happy or in any way enthusiastic but did not refuse to cooperate either. Envy spent a long while inspecting the piping to find out where would be the best place to emerge into the headquarters.

Envy eventually found a suitable way in, and the timing was good as well as it was well past the closing time of most restaurants and other establishments that were open late in the evening. Of course, even then the East City headquarters was not empty or unguarded.

Some more time passed as Envy did some additional studying of the structures for Shrike so that he could safely transmute a way into the cellar-like space. Eventually they had learned all they could. Shrike drew a transmutation circle and transmuted a tunnel upwards, slowly and carefully, making sure that he broke nothing and that he knew where all the materials were and how he would reconstruct it back just the way it had been. Envy pretty much yawned while he completed it.

After the tunnel was ready, a certain thing popped into Envy's mind. "You know, there's one thing about alchemy that I started wondering about some hundred years ago but that I don't think about very often," it said in a peculiar manner.

"Oh?" Shrike looked more curious than usual.

"Why does the transmutation circle have to glow? Stealthy transmutations would be nicer sometimes."

Shrike's eyes widened and he glared at Envy. "Yeah! Producing light requires energy. The transmutation circle directs energy from the tectonic shifts of the earth to whatever the alchemist wants to do. But the light isn't needed, so effectively transmutations just waste a part of the energy on something useless."

Envy liked Shrike's changing expression more than it cared to admit. He seemed confused first, then perplexed and finally just frowned furiously.

"Oookay!" said Envy, sounding rather debonair. "I'll just go up there and you can think about that in the meantime." Shrike definitely seemed to do just that. He sat on a large pipe and kept his deep frown.

Grinning, Envy crawled up the tunnel and into the room. Once it was there, it patted the wall of the tunnel twice to signal Shrike that he could seal the top of the tunnel temporarily. Shrike did so, leaving only a small hole, and Envy was in the dark.

It had brought a torch with it and now turned it on, though it kept the light inside itself so that only very little light emanated to the surroundings. Envy did not want to alert anyone by using more light than it needed because it could see in very little light.

Envy made its way to the door. It shapeshifted a tiny eye-appendage through the keyhole and checked that there were no people around. Once it had done that, it picked the lock and entered the hallway. Envy ran across two patrols on its search for the archives, but fortunately it managed to hide on both times. Eventually it also found the archives. Once there, it sneaked around until it found the transportation logs and spent a while reading them.

In the logs was an entry that indicated that a truck carrying "experimental weaponry" had indeed arrived and its contents had been transported to the weapons department. Envy of course did not believe that the homunculus would have been taken to where the weapons were. It spent a moment wondering what could have happened next. Perhaps the homunculus had just been taken to a holding space somewhere in the headquarters, which meant that Envy would have to comb through the complex. However, it did not think that even humans would be so careless as to hold a homunculus so close to regular people. Mustang would take it to a better, safer and more secure location.

Envy thought that a prison would be a good though not entirely ideal location. There would still be other humans in there, but it would definitely be better than the holding cells in the headquarters. It then went through the recent prison transports and found two that could be what it looked. Both of the transports had went to the same prison, called Southeastend Prison. Envy remembered having heard the prison's name before but not much else.

Envy then tried to find some information on the prisoners and the staff of the prison, but it could only find a few names of the prisoners that the military had put or escorted there.

Not being able to think of anything more it could check at the moment, Envy decided to leave and not risk getting caught any longer than was necessary. It put everything back in their proper places and then left to backtrack back to the cellar room. Since it now knew a straighter route, the trip took less time and it only ran across one patrol. Once it was safely in the cellar room again, it gave Shrike a sign by flashing the torch down the small hole Shrike had left on the floor.

Envy did not have to wait long until it saw the light of the transmutation as Shrike opened the way again. Envy climbed down, after which Shrike started working on sealing the tunnel thoroughly.

"I couldn't think of any reason for this light we see when alchemists transmute," said Shrike once he was done. "It's silly! I have no idea how to get rid of it but I'm sure it is useless."

Envy smirked at him. "Maybe that can be your area of study when you try to become a state alchemist."

Shrike looked contemplative. "Maybe..."

"You know, now that I think about it, the red lightning that happens when I shapeshift or regenerate is also useless. Does that mean that the energy of my Philosopher's Stone is wasted on silly light shows?"

"I-I don't know... It's possible, I guess."

Envy looked somewhat displeased. "Hmph. Anyway, let's leave." They started walking off. "My best guess is that they took the homunculus to Southeastend Prison, so next I have to figure out how to get there and snoop around..."

"Prison?" Shrike sounded obviously unenthusiastic.

"Yeah. If you have ideas for getting there stealthily, do share."

"Well... you could do something illegal and get caught and then they'd send you to the prison."

"That's not stealthy."

"It'd be like hiding in plain sight."

"No, it's stupid. The justice system would keep me in the city for too long and in the prison I'd be monitored too closely. Besides, if they didn't find me dangerous or if my sentence was short enough, they wouldn't even transport me from the city. And they could take me to an entirely different prison, too."

The two made their way in the sewers and eventually settled on taking over a space in the tunnels where Shrike could sleep.

Envy tried to think of some way to get into the prison. Some of its ideas were to impersonate a guard, pretend of be a new guard looking for a job or hide on a supply truck bound for the prison. Each of them had pros and cons to them. Getting hired as a new guard would take time. Impersonating another guard would risk being found out more easily. Overall, being a guard would restrict its movement and exploration options since it could not go to any place just like that. On the other hand, sneaking in and out of prison would be complicated and also risky, and Envy pondered that it was probably harder to hide in a prison than for example in the military headquarters since prisons at least should have been designed so that the prisoners would not be able to hide easily.

Envy spent the next day studying a truck station that was conveniently located next to the train station. It assessed how easy it would be to sneak in to read their records. It came to the conclusion that finding out about their doings would be relatively easy. The station was guarded rather superficially and the locks did not seem to be all that sophisticated. In fact, Envy worried more about the quality of their log entries.

Envy did not care what Shrike did, so it told him to stay in the hideout and only go above ground to get food. He did just that, though he also wrote a letter to the military and posted it. In it, he explained that Envy had gone through Central's and East City's archives and from them, had drawn the conclusion that the homunculus it had created had been transported from North City through Central to East City, from where the homunculus had been taken to Southeastend Prison, and Envy was now planning on going to check out the prison, probably by hiding in a truck bound for the prison.

In the evening, Envy felt annoyed because a train full of people from Central had just arrived and the people were bustling about all over the place, and even the truck station was busy loading some cargo that had come with the train.

Envy's annoyance soon turned to immense curiosity as it noticed that Major General Armstrong had arrived in the train, along with four other people from Briggs. Her leg seemed to be in bad condition since she used crutches to move around. A military car soon came to pick them up. Envy considered rudely commandeering a taxi, but came to the conclusion that it was obvious that Armstrong and her party were heading to East City headquarters. It then made its way there, on foot and through both streets and the sewer. Indeed, when it arrived to the building, it could see the same car in the inner court of the establishment.

Now the only problem was that Envy had no idea why she was there. It assumed she had come to see Mustang, but then what? Why would they meet? They were rivals and disliked each other, and Envy knew that Armstrong held little respect for the man.

After some moments of speculation, Envy's thoughts started revolving more around itself and it realised that it was the thing Armstrong and Mustang would have in common at the moment. Either Armstrong or Mustang somehow knew that Envy was in East City, or Armstrong had come to see its homunculus child. Envy felt irritatingly worried about the possibility that they knew it was in East City. It then pondered about the fact and came to the conclusion that there was no way they could know, because even if Shrike had phoned them the instant he learned they were going to go to East City, Armstrong would not have made it so fast from Fort Briggs. Envy was sure Shrike had made no such call, but at this very moment it realised that he could be making calls right now. Its face twisted with anger and it stomped determinedly into the nearest sewer hole and headed into their hideout.

Shrike was where Envy had left him. "Shrike!" it shouted angrily at him. Shrike startled and dropped the alchemy book he was reading. Envy walked right in front of him and stared at him. "Have you been telephoning Armstrong and letting her know where we are?"

Blood escaped from Shrike's face. "N-n-no..."

Envy frowned. Shrike was not lying, but his reaction was too severe. "Then how does she know I'm here?" it asked tightly.

"Er, I um... I wrote... but... she... what?"

"You wrote? You wrote what?!"

"L-l-letters..." Shrike looked almost like he was about to faint.

"The postal system isn't that effective!"

"I-I-I..." Shrike had to spend a moment just breathing to prevent himself from fainting.

Envy felt incredibly frustrated, but at the least his having to pause alleviated its impulsive anger for the moment.

"I j-just sent the letters... nothing else!" he said finally.

"When?"

"Today and some time after we arrived in Central."

Envy frowned, irritated. "Then why is she here?"

"I-I don't know." Envy waited. "Um... uh, maybe she just came to see Mustang? B-but why would she do that? She doesn't like him at all."

Envy made a very small smirk and got off of Shrike's face. "Don't send those letters from now on. And don't try to communicate with the military or other people in any way that might reveal them something about what we're doing. Is that clear?!"

Shrike nodded definitively, still incredibly pale from Envy's threatening behaviour even if it had not actually spelled out a threat.

Envy felt like tormenting Shrike a bit more. "Really? That's it? You promise?" it asked, disbelieving.

"Y-yes... I-I... I'm not sure how I could prove it to you. B-but I swear, I'll do what you asked."

"Why did you even send the letters in the first place?!"

"Armstrong told me to."

"And only NOW you decide that what I tell you overrides whatever she said?"

"Uh..."

Envy grew rather pissed. "Holy bloody hell, Shrike! Is that what you do? You bend to the will of anyone who makes the latest threat, is that it?! It's so stupid! It's so spineless! It's disgusting!" it exclaimed as it paced around the space.

Shrike turned his face down, closed his eyes and tried to calm himself. "I may bend but I don't break and that's why I'm alive," he thought to himself, not even dreaming of saying that aloud to Envy.

Envy stopped in front of him again, grabbed his chin determinedly and lifted his face. "Okay now, Shrike. Will you help me with rescuing the homunculus that I created?"

"Y-yes."

"And will you send any more information about our doings to anyone?"

"No."

"Will you do anything I tell you to do?"

"..." Shrike was speechless for a moment. "I can't."

"What's that?"

"I-I won't kill other people. Except, maybe, if they're trying to kill me... or... A-and I won't try to get myself killed. Um..."

"Hmh. Well, I guess that's acceptable." Envy still looked displeased but it backed away from Shrike, even if it still eyed him meanly.

Shrike wanted to apologise, but he understood that doing so would be extremely hypocritical. "Um... wh-what will we do now?"

"Do you have any idea why Armstrong would be here?"

"Uh... N-no..."

"I think Mustang called her to check out the homunculus I created."

"Oh. That would make sense, I guess."

"Hm. I'm going to rent a car. Tomorrow, we'll wait around headquarters and watch for them to come out. Then we follow them. Though they'll just probably go to the prison anyway."

"O-okay."

"I'll go get the car. Wait right here." Envy left.

It returned topside and had to spend some time searching for a car rental place. Once it found one, it paid for a week's rental and left with the car. It drove the vehicle to a parking area and parked among many cars just like the one it had just rented. After that, it returned to the sewers.

Shrike was even sitting in the exact spot he had been in when Envy had left, though he had picked up the alchemy book.

"You better sleep. We need to wake up early tomorrow," said Envy.

"Ah. Okay..." Shrike put the alchemy book away somewhat hesitantly, ate something and went to sleep.


	16. Destination

Like it had said, Envy woke Shrike up very early in the morning. It took him near the place where it had parked the car it had rented and then gave him the key. It told him to drive to a spot where he would be able to see the side entrance of the East City headquarters. In the meantime, Envy would be watching the main entrance. They went on their respective ways.

Shrike did not have too much trouble staying awake since the weather was rather cold, but he did have trouble concentrating on his task. Because he had nothing else to think about, his mind kept going back to the bizarre incident with Brendan. When he really thought about it, he felt incredibly uneasy about it. Still, it sort of felt like it had happened to someone else. Shrike had trouble recognising himself from his memories. That was probably because he had been drugged. Eventually Shrike came up with the thought that maybe it had been a dream. The events had felt real enough, but not quite as real as they could have been. The more time passed, the more surreal the event seemed. Shrike figured that the event fading from his memory was good. He definitely had no use for such a memory. He just hoped it would not somehow haunt his subconscious. That tended to happen often in the novels he read.

Envy had already gotten very bored when it finally saw what it had waited for: a small truck left the court of the headquarters, and inside the vehicle's driver's compartment it could see both Armstrong and Mustang as well as a driver. The two generals seemed to be talking heatedly to each other. Envy followed them just enough to see them take one of the main roads. Then it ran to where Shrike was waiting with their rented car.

Envy got into the car quickly. "Start the car!" it said to Shrike. "I spotted them. Turn right there." Shrike did as Envy told.

They followed the military car for a while and then Envy told Shrike to turn to a side road for a moment. "They might notice they're being followed. It's such a shame we can't change this car's appearance at all."

Shrike left it unmentioned that he could have tried to change the car with alchemy, because he was not entirely sure how to do it and he did not want to ruin something that was someone else's property. Luckily Envy did not happen to think of that.

They drove on the side road for just a short while before turning back on the main road. They soon found the military car again. At least the rented car looked quite similar to most of the other cars around, so it was easier to blend in.

When the military car headed out of the city and onto a country road, Envy told Shrike to stop the car again. Shrike parked it.

"Aren't we following them?"

"Yes, but if we just continue after them, they'll notice us for sure. We have to do something else. I can change into a fast-moving land animal, but you can't." Envy looked irritatedly at Shrike.

"Uh, well... if you run ahead and I follow you with the car? That way they wouldn't see me, right?"

"Eh, it'd be better if I wasn't seen at all. Some horse running after a car would be really weird too."

"Er... Maybe I could, uh, ride on you."

Envy chortled rather loudly. "Geez. I can't believe that's our best idea, but whatever. Let's go."

"Except... I can't ride in this getup," added Shrike, waving at the feminine dress and other obviously not very practical clothes and accessories he was wearing.

Envy sighed in frustration. "Yeah yeah, fine. Let's just go now. You can change your clothes in the forest."

They left the car and headed into the forest. Envy took some of their equipment with them. Once in the forest, Shrike changed into his military uniform as fast as he could while Envy changed into a horse-like creature; it was not entirely like a horse but rather an improved version. It also shapeshifted on itself some saddlebags where it stuffed the equipment.

"Okay, if they're driving fast, this will be a really rough ride. Pat me three times if you're going to throw up or something and I'll stop."

Shrike looked somewhat worried, but then climbed on Envy, and Envy started running. Envy's claim of the ride being rough was a definite understatement. If Shrike had eaten something in the last few hours, we would have thrown up, but for now he merely felt very nauseous. He had some difficulty holding on, but for now he had the energy. After some time he also noticed that the cold wind would cause trouble at some point.

Envy kept its eyes on the truck as it ran through the hills and sparse forest. Luckily for it, some snow had come down and the truck driver had to be careful to not go off the road, while Envy did not care about the small amount of snow. As it stared at the truck, it thought how Mustang had again made things more difficult for it and taken its new family away from it. Would he never stop? Would he just take away everything Envy had as long as they both lived? Envy saw the parallel to its own attitude of wanting to take people's friends away from them, but it only thought how it wanted to be on the taking end. It wanted to take away something of Mustang's. It wanted to kill everyone around him and leave him to suffer.

Envy managed to remember that it would not work; Mustang was too dangerous. He needed to be killed. Even if just killing him was less satisfying than taking everything away from him, Envy decided that doing that would have to suffice. Then it tried to come up with the most painful ways of killing him. His alchemy capabilities needed to be neutralised, which meant that he needed to lose his arms and possibly legs. Could the alchemists make the circle with their legs? After that Envy could probably burn him until he died, starting with his eyes. That would be incredibly fitting.

Envy also wondered what was up with Armstrong. It thought she was a butt-licking traitor and had been way off course when she had driven it from Fort Briggs, but it did not truly feel all that angry about her. She had all her loyal soldiers, sure, but Envy had taken one away from her and even if there had been some difficulties, Envy was certain enough that Shrike liked it better than her. It thought that in some way, it was winning over her.

After about ten minutes, Shrike saw some red sparks that usually accompanied Envy's shapeshifting. They were coming from Envy's front, but Envy had not shapeshifted.

"What was that?" shouted Shrike. Envy did not reply, but it seemed like it slowed down just a little.

Fifteen more minutes later, Envy finally caught up with the military car. Shrike managed to stand the ride for a little longer, but then he patted Envy and it stopped.

"What is it?" it asked exasperatedly. It sounded a bit like it was out of breath.

"I-it's too cold, my hands and legs are going numb, and I have trouble holding on. A-and I think I should pee."

"Fine, be quick about it. I'll shapeshift some more fur for your protection or something."

Shrike went to pee and afterwards also drank a bit of water. "What was that sparkling a while ago?"

"I was out of breath. I had to regenerate some lungs and then increased my lung size. Now get back on." Envy knelt down and Shrike got on it again. Now Shrike was considerably more protected from the elements and he even had an easier time staying on since Envy had modified the saddle-like spot.

It did not take too long for Envy to catch up with the military car. This far, the car had indeed been heading straight for the Southeastend Prison, but at some point it turned onto a side road that was not the way to the prison. Envy did not like that, but followed the car nevertheless. The car was much easier to follow on the side road because the road was not in as good a condition and the driver had to go more slowly.

The car reached its destination, a seemingly abandoned hydroelectric power plant next to a rapid in the river. When they got closer, Envy stayed more behind and shapeshifted so that it was smaller. It also told Shrike to get off and keep further away, so far that he could only barely see it.

The area around the building was mostly cleared of trees, but a bit further away at the edge of the forest, the vegetation had started invading the cleared area. Envy could see that here were tyre tracks in the snow around the place, but it could see no guards in the premises. However, there were two tiny buildings that were apparently used as guard posts, one next to the road and one a little upstream of the river. Envy assumed that there were people inside them, watching, and kept clear of them. Instead, it kept an eye on the car from the edge of the forest.

Eight people got out of the car: Armstrong, Mustang, two of Armstrong's four soldiers and four more soldiers, apparently from East City. They all gathered in front of the main door of the facility. A soldier opened the door and spoke to the two generals shortly before letting them all in.

Envy backed down a little and signed for Shrike to come to it.

"Now what?" whispered Shrike once he had reached Envy.

"How probable would you say is that the homunculus is in there?"

"Um... quite probable. Why else would they come here?"

"Yeah. Hm, we should wait until they leave and then I could go in and bust it out. It doesn't seem like this is that fortified a stronghold, if it's a stronghold in the first place."

"Yeah."

"Except... if this is Mustang's last attempt to get something out of it before killing it... Then they could kill it right before they leave!"

"That sounds... um... Actually I don't know how that sounds."

"Too paranoid, was that what you were going to say? Heck, even I thought I'd have plenty of time but right now I really don't feel like I do! What if they are going to kill it? I need to go and find out what they're doing." Envy did not even consider that Shrike would come along with it, and Shrike similarly assumed that of course he would not go in.

"How will you get in?"

"Not through the door!" Envy eyed the sparse and small windows of the building and soon decided that they would be out of the question as well. The two large chimneys looked like better entryways, but there would be no way to get into them without being seen unless Envy shapeshifted into a bird and flew there.

Envy knew it weighed far too much to be able to fly. At the start of its life, it had tested how large wings it would have to have to be able to fly, and had only barely managed to strenuously keep itself airborne for a few seconds with a wingspan of about 40 metres, and the amount of muscle it had needed for that had been utterly ridiculous. After that Pride had been unnecessarily dire with it.

Envy turned its eyes toward the river and the structure over it. "What's that?"

"The... Oh, I guess there are turbines and ...other things that transform the water's work into mechanical energy that can then be converted into electricity. I'm not too familiar with how that works."

"Could I get into the building through there?"

"Maybe... I don't know why there would be a way in, though. Wait, of course there should be a way so that they can perform maintenance on it. Even that can't function without maintenance."

"Hm. Okay, I'll just try to sneak in through there. You wait here. Just in case it isn't obvious, don't talk to them or let them know you're here or anything."

"But what if they find me?"

"Well don't tell them about me then!"

"Um... but I think Armstrong will figure out you're here if she sees me."

Envy sighed angrily. "Geez, just go a bit further down there and they won't find you. Oh, hm... Listen, you can make a some sort of distraction, right? Alchemical explosions or other stuff like that."

"Er... I don't know how to make explosives."

Envy was frustrated. "Anything? How about if you heat a tree or something enough, it will catch on fire, right?"

"Um... yes."

"Okay then, do that if I give you the signal. If you can, light up a tree as close to the building as possible."

"But won't that endanger the people?"

"No, the building is far away enough."

"But what if the forest catches on fire?"

"Shrike! It's winter! Also, you can freeze the burning parts and divide the heat to such a wide area that it won't be a problem, right?! Even I know that much about that thing you do!"

Shrike just stared obediently at Envy.

"Okay? Now, the signal... well, do it if I let out a yell like this... Groauh! Or if I make this bird call. Eeeee-eee-eeeee! Got it?"

"Er, yeah. But, why two calls?"

"The first one happens if I'm fighting against them and they know I'm there. The second one happens if I'm still hiding."

"Oh, okay. Um... how long are you planning on being there?"

"I'll get back as soon as I can. Of course I have no way to know whether that means ten minutes or ten days."

"Um... Well, I can stay here for a long time if it doesn't get colder. Actually, then I could probably dig a cave with alchemy, so."

"Hm. Well, wait for the ten days. After that, do whatever."

"Right."

Envy turned and moved away silently, not saying a word. It shapeshifted into a bear and walked deeper into the forest. It carefully circled the area until it came to the river. Once there, it advanced stealthily along the river until it could just see the guard post and the main building.

The river was not frozen, and Envy had been planning on entering the water and diving for so long that it could just emerge right under the power generators and grab hold of the maintenance structures. Envy spent a moment breathing deeply and calmly and then entered the river. The water was near freezing, but Envy endured it and dived.

Envy swam the relatively short distance to the power generators. The river was rapid on that spot and it could only barely observe how the structures looked like from above before it was already taken through the dam-like structure by the stream.

Cursing in its mind, Envy kept itself under the water's surface and swam away from the power plant. Once it was far enough, it got out of the water and started circling and running back to its previous entry point.

Envy's second attempt proved more useful. It managed to latch onto a ladder and climbed up. There was no one on guard in the maintenance structures. A single door led inside the main building. It had a small window but no lock. Just beyond the door, Envy could see a soldier standing guard. He seemed bored, but Envy was rather sure it would not get past him without causing a commotion. After a quick look around, Envy spotted an alternative way in: a small ventilation grate high in the main building's wall.

Some moments passed as Envy studied the newly-found ventilation shaft. Like in proper buildings, the shaft was too small for a human to crawl through, but that did not stop Envy. After it had carefully removed the grate, it shapeshifted into a long and thin snake and squirmed inside the ventilation shaft. It had to make itself unusually long to distribute its weight onto as wide an area as possible, because otherwise the shafts might collapse – after all, they were meant to transport just air. Envy felt uncomfortable about its long form since it would lose most of its body if it was cut in half near its head which was where it was keeping its Philosopher's Stone.

Envy passed the ventilation machines with a little difficulty. There was only one filter blocking its way, and it carefully cut a suitable hole in it. Slowly and silently, Envy headed into the cellar area. The cellar level did not seem to be very big, which was a relief for it. It saw from one ventilation grate that one side of the small complex seemed to contain at least some of the surviving bestial chimeras. Envy did not think that the homunculus child would have been kept with the chimeras. It stared wondering whether the child was there at all, since it was possible that Armstrong had come to see the chimeras out of personal interest, but it decided to at least look through the building.

Envy's next voyage was to the other side of the small cellar complex. It came across a strangely fortified grate that was made of plates of some heavy material. Envy shapeshifted an eye-appendage through the grate and took a peek into the room. What it saw was both very encouraging and quite discouraging.

Major Generals Armstrong and Mustang were in the room, having a tiff of some kind. The homunculus child was lying on a bed, immobile.


	17. Capture

It was the end of December 1916. The homunculus child decided that it would be a good day to find out what it felt like to be a tree. It shapeshifted into a small animal and ran out of the abandoned farm house it spent its time in when it was cold.

The child dug through the snow and searched for a good spot. It did not spend much time looking, but took root in a nice-looking place next to a big spruce and a waist-high boulder. It spent some hours there and felt like sleeping, so it slept and like a tree, it did not care much for its environment.

Hours later, it woke up and shapeshifted into a lynx. It trotted around for some time before deciding to return to the farm house. It approached the house from the back and since the back door was blocked by snow, it climbed the wall to the second story and went in through the window. Having done that, it shapeshifted into human form, thought about its look for a moment and changed into another kind of human.

It heard something metallic drop onto the wood floor behind it in another room. It quickly turned around and saw two soldiers, one of whom was staring at it his with mouth open wide and the other was fumbling for his dropped gun.

"H-halt!" shouted the soldier that had managed to hold onto his gun. "Arado! Come up here!" They stared in surprise until a third soldier walked up the stairs and came to them.

"Sir?"

"We've got a ...some thing."

The soldier called Arado looked at the child and mimicked the other two, pulling out his pistol and aiming at the child. He looked very confused since he did not understand why they were aiming at someone who looked like a 13-year-old in odd clothes.

"What are you?!" asked the soldier who had spoken first.

The child did not reply. It felt alarmed.

"Answer!"

"I can't."

"What? Why?" The soldier waited but got no reply. "Does that mean even you don't know? What's your name?" When he still got no reply, he frowned and turned to the others. "Okay, let's take him with us and report back."

"No. I want to stay here," said the child.

"That's unacceptable. We have to take you with us."

"Why?"

"That's none of your business."

"...This is clearly my business since it concerns me. I will not come with you."

"You will."

"No."

"You will or I'll shoot you." The child glared at the gun, frowning and obviously displeased. "Are we clear?" The child did not protest now.

However, the confused soldier spoke now. "Er, sir."

"What?"

"I would like to know why we're pointing our guns at a preteen."

"Oh. He, well, changed shape. He was a lynx first."

"...What?"

"I'm serious! Fouga, tell him you saw it too."

"I did," replied Fouga.

Arado just stared at the other two.

"Come on, trust me. Seriously, I couldn't make this up even if I wanted to."

Arado seemed to agree. Fouga had started studying a map.

"Where is the closest settlement where we can get access to a phone?" asked the soldier who seemed to be in charge.

"At our destination. Let's just keep heading the same way, sir."

The leader turned to the child again. "Do you live here?"

"I sleep here."

"Why is there a military overcoat here?" He pointed at a furry Briggs overcoat that Envy had brought for the child.

"There was an old campsite approximately twenty kilometres to the south, and there were a few abandoned rations and this coat. I took it because I was cold and it was warm."

"Hm. Arado, can you inspect that coat? Is there any blood on it?"

"No, sir."

"Good. How is it possible that you were a lynx?" asked the leader from the child. The child did not reply. "Why don't you answer me?"

"I have nothing to say."

"Nothing to say? Normal people don't turn into lynxes!"

"I have never seen 'normal' people."

The leader scoffed and scratched his head. "You're one strange case, you know that?" The child did not reply. "Are you the only one who lives here?"

"Maybe."

"Maybe? What do you mean maybe? How can you not know if someone else lives here?"

"There might be some animals living somewhere here but I do not care about them."

"...Oh. But there are footprints of a few larger animals and humans inside! How do you explain those? And there were no tracks outside at all."

"Well, the kid could have changed into a lot of animals and then walked around, sir," said Fouga.

"Oh, right. Hey you, what should I call you?" the leader asked from the child. "It's really inconvenient to say 'hey you' at you."

"I don't know."

The leader sighed. "Okay, you're going to be 'the kid' from now on. You look pretty young. Well, are we done now?"

"Yeah, we were finished with the searching, sir."

"Okay, let's move out. Fouga, you first. Then you, kid."

"Outside? It is too cold there."

"Well, take the coat." The leader threw the military overcoat to the child.

"This is not enough."

"You have those clothes that you're wearing too!"

"...I have no clothes."

"Don't be ridiculous."

The child shapeshifted its clothes away so that it only had a very simple black swimsuit-looking outfit. Arado gawked.

"Uh... fine. We have one extra uniform, right?"

"Yes," said Fouga. "But it's too big for him."

"Darnit."

"But... but... he just changed shape!" yelled Arado. "That's impossible! How can you do that? Is it some kind of alchemy?"

"I don't know."

Arado kept quiet and just stared.

"You're very frustrating, you know that, kid?" commented the leader.

Again, the child did not reply.

"But... If he really can change shape, he can become taller and then the spare uniform will fit," continued Arado.

"Oh! That's a good idea!" exclaimed the leader. "Okay, let's go."

The child and the three soldiers walked down the stairs and out of the farm house. Outside, there were two more soldiers waiting next to a row of skis, ski poles, backpacks and a pulk.

"Who is that?" asked one of the two new soldiers.

"Believe it or not, he's a shapeshifter and we found him in the second story," said the leader of the soldiers.

"...What?"

"Oh, you'll see soon enough. Jaime, dig out our extra uniform and give it to the kid."

The other new soldier obeyed. As the child then put on the uniform and shapeshifted so that the clothing fit it perfectly, the two soldiers glared. The child did not like being stared at so much and looked displeasedly at the soldiers.

"So, I take it the barn was empty?"

"Yeah, sir."

"Nothing more in the house either. Let's head out then. Kid, can you keep on running or walking?"

The child wondered what they would do if it said no. It hoped that they would leave it behind. "No."

"Okay, then you're going to sit in the pulk. Whose turn is it to pull it?" The soldiers put their skis back on. Fouga took the pulk, positioned himself as the second one in their line and tied the pulk's pulling rope to his equipment.

The child was annoyed. It would rather have walked, but it decided to hold on to its lie for now. It moved the equipment on the pulk and sat between two bags.

Once the soldiers were ready, they started skiing again. It was obvious Fouga had trouble pulling the pulk with the child on it, so another soldier took a turn pulling it rather soon and they switched pullers rather often after that.

After it had gotten so dark that they could not see without lights, the soldiers put up a tent and set up night watch shifts. Because of the night watch, there was one free sleeping bag, so the child got to sleep in one.

Before they settled to sleep, the soldiers ate rations. One of them handed them out to the others who thanked and started eating. Lastly, the soldier also offered the child a portion. The child looked at the food a little curiously but took it, thanked and ate it since that was what the others had done.

The leader of the soldier group was called Lorraine. He kept asking the child questions about its origins and what it had been doing, but like Envy had instructed earlier, the child told nothing.

"Come on!" said Lorraine. "Why aren't you replying to any of my questions? It can't really be that hard to say what you did yesterday. Are you trying to keep us from learning of some atrocities you've done?"

"No." By now, even the child was rather irritated at the repetitiveness of the questions. "Please shut up," it said, not pleading but stern and defiant. "You threatened to shoot me, forced me to leave the place where I wanted to remain and keep asking me the same questions. I do not want to nor will I answer your questions, even if I had something to say." It spoke relatively politely since it thought that would make them comply easier.

Lorraine was obviously displeased but he decided to not push the child any further. "Fine."

The child looked at him and wondered if it should turn the questions around. "Why did you have to take me with you?" The soldiers did not reply. The child scoffed and was quiet.

The child did not sleep much during the night, though it pretended to, just to avoid the otherwise inevitable questions about that. When the light levels started increasing again, the soldiers got up and ate again. A soldier called Roland did not eat, but he had eaten approximately twice as much as the others before they had went to sleep.

Lorraine asked the child whether it was ready to walk now, and it said yes. It then ran with the soldiers and did not slow them down, so they arrived at an occupied farm house by afternoon. Lorraine went to ask for directions, after which they continued moving for another hour and reached what was the tiny centre of a small sparsely populated village. They searched for and found the local post office that also housed the local authorities.

The group of five soldiers and the child entered the smallish wooden house. The space on the left had two tables with chairs and no one at them. The space to their right had a small collection of office and postal supplies. To the front of them was a counter where the workers were supposed to be, and at the moment there was only one person there, a curious woman in her early thirties, dressed in the military police uniform.

"Why hello! We haven't had soldiers around here for quite some time. What would you like?"

"Pleased to meet you, and sorry to intrude," said Lorraine and took off his hat and gloves. "Well, my first order of business would be to make a phone call."

"Certainly. The phone is here in the kitchen." The woman led Lorraine to the kitchen. "If you need privacy, I'll just go over to the tables. The room through here is a cleaning closet, and as you can see, there's no one in there. Do you want to see the room on the other side as well?"

"Yes, please."

The woman led Lorraine to the room next to the kitchen. "I'm Officer Gwen Fragherty, by the way."

"Sergeant Major Fred Lorraine."

"This is our items storage, also empty. The small room here is our files archive." Fragherty showed the places diligently, leaving no doubt about them being empty.

"Thanks, that was very thorough! Hopefully I'll manage to make this call quickly."

Fragherty led him back to the kitchen. "Oh, I better offer the others some cookies. Don't worry, we'll save some for you for when you're done," she said as she grabbed a bag of cookies from the kitchen and left Lorraine in peace. Lorraine picked up the phone, dialled the number and after speaking shortly with the person on the other end, started waiting for the line to be confirmed secure.

Fragherty took the cookies in a bowl to the rest of the soldiers who had settled around a table. "Here are some cookies. I'd offer something more but it'll obviously have to wait until your sergeant major is done with the phone call."

"Well, thank you, Officer!" said Arado. All soldiers but Jaime took cookies. The child took some as well.

"Please, call me Gwen. So, what brings you here? Or, maybe that's not a good question, your mission is probably secret."

"Oh, we were just patrolling, but yeah, you're right," replied Jaime.

"Well, where did you come from? That's not secret, right?"

"Nah. We're from East City."

"Oh? You're pretty far from home."

"Yeah, that happens... But how about you, do you run this place by yourself?"

"Not quite, there's another one too. Old Mick is the senior officer. He lives on the other side of this building. We're both police officers and postal workers. We have to do both jobs since there isn't enough work for either profession separately!" explained Fragherty.

"Ah, I see. Well, that sounds like it's a working arrangement in these small villages."

Meanwhile, Lorraine waited for the secure line and eventually got it.

"Hello?" said the voice over the phone.

"Sergeant Major Fred Lorraine here."

"Captain Vato Falman. Why are you calling?"

"I and my team found something special in Hillforest just west of this village, Cornfer, which is east of... Well, actually this is pretty much in the middle of nowhere, sir. It's a long way northeast of North City."

"Yes, I can see it on the map. What exactly did you find?"

"Something really weird. You know how you listed some of the special things we should look out for? I'm pretty sure we found a shapeshifter. When we first saw him, he was a lynx, and then he changed into a person right in front of us."

"A shapeshifter?! Are you sure? Are you sure it wasn't just regular alchemy, or some kind of camouflage?"

"Well, doesn't alchemy require that circle thing? There were no circles there. And then he changed into a different person and then his clothes off and then into another person again. And when he changed, there were these red sparkles all over his body."

"What did you do then?"

"We made him come with us. He's waiting with my squad in the main room."

"You what? Impressive. What did the shapeshifter say his name was?"

"He didn't give us one at all. He seems kind of out of it. I think he was being a tad moody about having to have to come with us for some reason. I can't understand why he'd have rather stayed there. It seems like he was staying at a long abandoned farm a day's skiing trip from this village, with nothing but a few animal skins and one old coat for protection."

Falman was speechless at the other end of the line. "Er... how did you make him come with you?"

"Well, I first said we'll be taking him, then he said no, then I said yes, then he said no again and then I said I'd shoot him and he obeyed."

"Just like that?"

"Yeah. Sir. Er, you sound like you're pretty amazed about this. Wasn't this what you expected?"

"Honestly speaking, no. But good job out there! So, do you know how the shapeshifter really looks like?"

"Really? Um... Now that I think about it, I don't think so. First he was just like a lynx and in the end he pretty much copied our appearance. He has a face of his own, though, young and round and with shoulder-length black hair."

"Were there any tattoos on him?"

"Tattoos?" Lorraine sounded perplexed. "Not that I saw. But why would a shapeshifter have tattoos?"

"Never mind. What is your impression of him? Is he perhaps hateful or violent or something else?"

"Um... I think he's mostly just so-so. A little sullen too. I think he was annoyed when I kept asking him questions and he didn't want to answer. But otherwise he's actually been kind of polite."

"Polite?" asked Falman somewhat disbelievingly.

"Well, yeah. Sir. Besides that one time, he hasn't complained about having to come with us and he says thanks and please and everything."

"That... sounds quite peculiar."

"Really? Do you know this shapeshifter we found?"

"I really can't say," replied Falman, with all the meanings of the phrase.

"What should we do?"

"Do the authorities there have a car you can borrow? You should get to North City as soon as possible."

"Well, she could probably give us a ride toward south and then we could get on a train..."

"No, you need to keep that shapeshifter as secret as possible. The fewer people see him, the better. Has anyone other than you and your team seen him?"

"Just the policewoman who's keeping up the house here. Gwen Fragerty is her name. Though... I think she thinks that the shapeshifter is actually a part of my team since he looks just like a soldier now. Unless my team has said otherwise but I don't think they have."

"Hm, good. Ask Fragherty if she has a car you can borrow."

"Yes, sir, just a moment." Lorraine left the telephone on the table and went back into the common room. "Excuse me, Officer Fragherty? You you happen to have a vehicle we can borrow?"

"Well, there is the police car. But it only fits five."

"But there are – – Wait, you're right..."

"That is our only car but if you really need it, we can make do without it for a while. We have a snowmobile here and I'm sure the good villagers would lend us a hand."

"All right, thank you very much!" Lorraine returned to the phone. "She has just one car, but we can borrow it. But not all of my team will be able to come along, I'll have to leave one of them here."

"I see. Well, take the car and head to North City. Leave one of your team there, we'll send someone to pick him up later. Is any one of you familiar with the map or locations of North City?"

"Yes, Lance Corporal Arado is."

"Good. I want you to head for a warehouse by the number 13 in the old military area in the northeastern area at the edge of the city. It's a couple of kilometres south of the intersection of roads N72 and NE21. You'll meet another team there and they will give you further instructions. They should show you their papers and you should meet either First Lieutenant Pareil or Second Lieutenant Suffren."

"Okay, got it."

"You should be able to get there in five hours, correct?"

"In ideal circumstances, yes, but it's winter now. I suspect it will take almost six hours."

"All right. Don't let the shapeshifter out of your eyes. Do you have any more questions?"

"Nope, sir."

"Acknowledged. Good luck! Falman out."

"Thanks!" Lorraine hung up the phone and felt rather curious about the sudden rush with getting the shapeshifter to North City. Nonetheless, it was not his place to question those orders. He came out of the kitchen again. "Sorry to tell you this, but we gotta go. The boss wants us to leave right away."

"Oh, that's a shame," commented Fragherty. "But do have some cookies before you leave! I wish I could offer you a couple cups of coffee but I don't have any ready."

"Thank you. Oh, since we all don't fit in the car, one of us needs to stay here."

"Ah, sir, I would like to stay," said Jaime. "My legs have been hurting oddly today so if I get a chance like this, I'd like to let them rest a bit."

"All right. Someone will come get you later then. Well, Officer Fragherty, would you kindly lend us your car?"

"Just hang on while I get the key," she said with a smile. Lorraine visited the loo and then Fragherty showed the soldiers to the vehicle, which was an off-road automobile with a heavier hull. It was loaded with winter gear and had chains on the tyres. "There's a spare container of fuel in the back. Once you get to the main road to North City, take the chains off. That road is travelled often enough that you won't need them if you're careful."

"All right. Thanks for the cookies!"

The soldiers loaded their equipment on and in the car and then packed themselves into it. Lorraine asked his soldiers whether they had mentioned that the child was not one of them, and when they said that they had not, he told Jaime to keep it that way. The soldiers placed the child in the middle of the back seat.

The trip to North City was very uneventful. They stopped four times to switch the driver and to take off the chains. It was already night when they arrived at the warehouse area.

After some inconvenient bureaucracy, the soldiers ordered the child into a crate and it was loaded into a truck that left for Central right away.

* * *

From then on, the child spent most of its time in the crate and was only left out for very short periods of time at break times. Its requests for better seating and something to do were ignored. It started feeling rather bitter about the whole issue and eventually just sat in the box, sulking.

In Central, the box was loaded into another truck. That truck took it to East City where it was loaded into a smaller truck. It was then taken out of the city, but only to an area somewhat nearby.

The child did not know and at the moment, did not care how much time had passed. It guessed about two days. It had lost its peace and privacy and had not been able to sleep for a while.

Some soldiers unloaded the child's box from the truck into a hall and let it out. They led it through a couple of corridors into a lift that took it down, probably about seven metres. Their destination was a bare, rather clinical room. A cold fluorescent tube was in the metal ceiling and the concrete walls had been painted white. There was a small grate high in one corner of the room and another grate in the opposite corner near the floor. The room was furnished with a simple table with a drinking glass sitting on it, two chairs, a very simple bunk, a sink and a toilet, but nothing else. The door of the room was fortified. The child noticed that the wall on which the door was was made of metal instead of concrete. The metal wall had a somewhat large fortified window on it as well as a likewise fortified mirror of inferior quality.

The soldiers closed and locked the door behind the child.

The child definitely did not like the looks of the situation. However, at the least it was alone and in peace now, and there was a bed in front of it. It took off its shoes, left them next to the door, used the toilet and then promptly crawled into the bed and slept.

It woke up some hours later but was slow in getting up since it had no idea what it would do. It was hungry and looked around the room, wondering how it could get food. It saw that there was a soldier in the corridor on the other side of the window. The soldier was watching it. It walked to the window.

"Hey!" it shouted.

The soldier showed a hand sign and another person opened a small hatch on the door. "What is it?"

"Can I get some food?"

"At eight."

"At eight? When is that?"

"In about seven hours."

The child frowned. "Am I supposed to just sit here and do nothing?"

Apparently the soldier had a hard time answering. "I suppose so." When the child did not reply for a short moment, the soldier closed the hatch.

Displeased once again, the child paced around the room a few times. Then it filled the glass with water and drank it. After that, it spent about ten minutes thinking of something it could do and eventually decided to perform some body control exercises. As a shapeshifter, controlling its body came very easily to it, but it also needed that ability in a much greater extent to shapeshift properly and effortlessly, and that was something that came mostly with practice. For the next six hours, the child performed very odd and controlled movements and positions. It did not like that the soldier guards outside kept watching it, but at least they only seemed sort of curious, and since it could not do anything to them, it just tried to ignore them. For the last hour, it practised shapeshifting and tried to come up with an appearance of its own.

When the seven hours had passed, a soldier brought it a tray of food. It thanked for the food, which confused the soldier. When it was done eating, it gave the tray back and asked when it would next get food. The soldier told that in six hours.


	18. Contortion

Six hours did not pass until the child was disturbed again. In the middle of its physical control exercise, the door to the room was opened and two higher-ranking soldiers came in. The shorter one of them was aiming a rifle at it. The child stood upright and looked at them, alarmed. Both of the soldiers were clearly wary as well. The taller one had a rather round face, short black hair and the rank marks of a major general. The shorter one had big eyes, just slightly longer blond hair and the rank marks of a colonel. From the information Envy had given the child, it recognised that the taller one was Roy Mustang and blond-haired one was Riza Hawkeye. It also knew what Mustang had done, so it looked at him somewhat intently and felt uneasy.

"Who are you?" asked Mustang.

The child replied after a short moment of silent staring at the rifle. "I don't know."

"How can you not know who you are?"

"How can you know who you are?"

Mustang frowned at the child. "Are you a homunculus?"

"Yes."

"Who created you?"

Now the child realised that while it had been shapeshifting, it had occasionally looked somewhat like Envy, so it could not deny knowing Envy and lying would probably anger the humans. "Envy did."

"WHAT?" shouted Mustang. "How is that possible?!"

The child flinched and glared at Mustang. It could not get over the nervousness of having a rifle pointed at it. "I don't know."

"When did he create you? How old are you?" The child did not reply. "Answer me!"

"When will I get out of here?"

Mustang scoffed. "I'll ask the questions. How old are you?"

"...Two months."

Mustang looked quite angry. "I can't believe this. How could she have missed something like this?" he muttered to himself. "What is your purpose?" The child did not reply. "Answer me!"

"No."

"Why don't you answer my questions?"

"Why are you asking me questions?"

"To find out if you're dangerous."

"Then why don't you ask me whether I am dangerous?"

"Would you answer truthfully?"

"Yes. If you do not think I will answer truthfully, why are you asking any questions at all?"

"You will answer me or I will burn you." He lifted his hand and Hawkeye backed away slightly.

The child grew instantly more concerned and lifted its hands up. "No, wait."

"You seem to know what I can do. I assume Envy told you." The child continued glaring at him, anxious. He lowered his hand. "Now tell me, what is your purpose?"

"I don't know."

"Not good enough." He lifted his hand again.

"Wait, wait!" the child shouted. "I am not lying! I truthfully do not know. Maybe I have no purpose."

Mustang lowered his hand. "Then why did Envy create you?"

"...I don't know! I am unable read its mind. Why are you even asking me that?"

"You know what I think? I think you're lying. I certainly doubt Envy would create you without any purpose. You're probably the first of many more homunculi who Envy will create. Or one of many he has already created. And eventually he will try to use those homunculi as an army to attack Amestris. That is, if he ever grows enough brains to organise something like that. I don't think he will, but even a disorganised attack is something I do not tolerate."

"...What?" As the child remembered the mannequin soldiers and what the other homunculi had done, it began to frown and eventually looked quite inconvenienced.

"How many more homunculi has Envy created?"

"I don't – – None."

"And why should I believe you?"

"Envy lost its ability to perform alchemy right after it had created me. And I was the first one it created."

"Do you seriously think I would believe that?"

Now the child stared at Mustang defiantly before turning away and crossing its arms on its chest.

"Miffed because I figured out your plan so easily?"

"I can't respond because you are nonsensical and imagine ridiculous things," the child commented at the wall.

"I have every reason to believe you're lying."

"Why?"

"How daft are you? Or do you seriously claim to not know about what your kind has done?"

"I am not them and I have not met them."

"You are one of them." Mustang's expression suddenly changed and he became even more alerted. "You could be Envy!"

"I am not."

"Then prove it."

The child looked angry and turned back at Mustang. "How would I do that?" Hawkeye was still aiming at it with her rifle, which did not help the child's peace of mind at all.

"That's your problem." He seemed even harsher now.

"I am not Envy, I am not lying and I have done nothing to you or anyone else, nor will I."

Mustang frowned for a moment. "You ugly green slug."

Under other circumstances, the child could have been amused. "That is incredibly infantile even from an obviously prejudiced human like you."

"Well, you might not be Envy. And I think that you haven't done anything to anyone only because we caught you before you could. One more chance, homunculus. How big is your army? And who are you?"

"I have no name, and there is no army!" Mustang lifted his hand again. "No, wait! Wait! WAIT!" The child brought its hands up again as protection and looked rather frightful. Mustang waited for a short moment, but when the child said nothing, the air around him crackled, and he snapped his fingers.

The front of the clothes the child was wearing burned away instantly, and the rest charred and fell off. The child's hands, skin and face burned off and its excruciation was incredible. Before this, it had barely gotten a few scrapes and cuts. The pain from the fire was hideous and the pain from the regeneration even more so. The child fell down like a rag doll, writhing and shrieking and not being able to control its regeneration in any way. It kept its size, humanoid shape and four limbs, but its skin and face regenerated back as somewhat bestial and slightly furry, as its true form had been.

The ventilation system began to blow out the smoke that had resulted from the child's clothes burning. The child, however, kept screaming. It tried to stumble upright but could only bring itself on its hands and knees, still shaking and writhing. Both Mustang and Hawkeye were confused.

After the child had regenerated, it looked up with teary, hateful and desperate eyes and jumped at Mustang instantly. Both Mustang and Hawkeye had seen it coming and stepped aside. Hawkeye shot the child in the chest, and Mustang burned its arms and face again, though not as thoroughly this time since he needed to control the burst enough to not hit Hawkeye.

While Mustang and Hawkeye circled the space to stand next to the table in the other end of the room, the child crashed into the frame of the fortified door and squirmed on the floor again as it screamed and regenerated. Very painfully, it pushed itself up into a sitting position against the door and looked toward the other end of the room with eyes that could not see yet, though plenty of tears fell down from the regenerating sockets. It then screamed while it was still weeping and regenerating. "Aaahaa! Stop! Please stop! It hurts so much! Aah! I'll say whatever you want me to say!"

Mustang honestly could not say anything to that. Could that have been an act? Would Envy seriously say something like that?

"Please stop! It hurts! Please stop..." It continued crying, even after it had fully regenerated again.

"...Move away from the door," said Mustang.

The child immediately scampered on its knees and stumbled further from the door, getting on its feet while it did so. It went into the corner with the mirror, as far away from the two as possible. It first stared at them completely frightened, tears still running down its face. Then it caught a glimpse of itself in the mirror and startled. It eyed itself very peripherally from the mirror, not wanting to turn its eyes away from Mustang. It frowned and shapeshifted its feral qualities away, becoming a relatively normal-looking human again, though now instead of an Amestrian uniform, it had a black bodysuit like the other homunculi had had.

Mustang and Hawkeye moved back to the door, and simultaneously the child moved along the wall further from the door until it reached the next corner, the one furthest from the door. It slid down along the wall and hid behind the bed, gasped and sobbed.

"Get up," said Mustang. The child obeyed. "Sit at the table." The child did so. It still shook and fidgeted while Hawkeye kept aiming at it. "Now, what is your name?"

"I-I do n– – I-it... it i-is... um... H– – no, Ma– – no, K-K-uh, no... It's..." After a very short moment of panicking, it just shook its head from side to side and fidgeted. "I can't, I am sorry, please don't burn me! I do not have a name, I could not come up with one and even Envy was frustrated with that but I still could not come up with one! Please do not burn me!" It buried its head in its arms, curled up on the chair and sobbed.

Mustang still did not know what to think of the situation, but he was now quite sure that the child was not Envy and had not been lying about there not being any more homunculi. "How big is your army?"

"...Um... um... uh, ten? No, I mean twenty..."

"Twenty homunculi like you?"

"Um... yes?"

"Were you serious when you said Envy couldn't do alchemy after he created you?"

"Y-yes."

"How could he then have created more homunculi?"

The child just opened and closed its mouth a few times. It could not come up with anything that would suddenly fix the discrepancies of its claims.

"When will you attack, and where?"

"Um... um... in... in a year? At, uh, Central..."

"All right. Now quit it with those ridiculous lies and tell me the actual truth."

The child was speechless. "B-but... You just..."

"Shut it. So, you have no name?"

"R-right."

"Envy couldn't come up with one for you?"

"It... said I should name myself."

"And you couldn't come up with one for yourself?"

"Not this far..."

"And there is no army of homunculi?"

"R-right."

"You and Envy are the only ones?"

"Yes."

"And Envy lost his ability to perform alchemy after he made you?"

"Yes."

"Where did he get your Philosopher's Stone?"

"U-uh... Envy gave me one-third of its."

"What? How could he split it?"

"Uh... uh... I d-don't know."

"Can you perform alchemy?"

"N-no."

"Have you tried?"

"Yes..."

Mustang frowned. "How many people have you killed?"

The child frowned as well. "Uh, n-none."

"Why not?"

"...What? Why would I?"

"You homunculi hate humans. So why haven't you killed anyone?"

"...What? What? I-I know Envy hates humans, but I do not, particularly."

"That sounds like a lie."

"Wh-wh– – But... Well... uh, I um... I hate you, sort of."

"Oh really?"

"O-or... or think you are an idiot, but... um..."

"And why's that?"

"W-what? Because you burned me!"

"Why do you think I burned you?"

"B-because you are too stupid to tell that I am not lying."

"Really. And not because your kind, say, killed probably hundreds of humans and indirectly caused the deaths of perhaps millions?"

"That was not me!" the child shouted. Mustang held up his hand again. The child got up so abruptly that the chair it had been sitting on flew to the back wall and the table almost tipped over. "NO! NO! PLEASE NO!" it cried as it took cover behind the table.

Mustang was confused again. "Why do you fear this so much? It isn't like you would die for good even if I did it a few more times."

"It hurts! IT HURTS SO MUCH!" The child turned the table over for its protection and started sobbing again.

Mustang huffed. "We're wasting our time." He and Hawkeye left the room and the door was locked again.

The child shook behind the table for two more minutes until it managed to peek around it and then stumbled over to the bed. It then dug itself under the cover and the sheets and cried. Even though it had known from the information that Envy had given it that humans could be incredibly mean and irrational, it had thought that that was mostly because of how Envy felt about humans. It could not have imagined getting burned just for existing and it certainly had not thought it would hurt so terribly.

In about twenty minutes, the memory of the pain faded enough so that it could think about its situation rationally again. It dug itself out of the bed and walked just slightly shakily to the sink to drink. At least it had left the glass on the sink rather than on the table. After it had drunk, it turned the table upright again, placed the chair next to it and then kicked the remains of its previous clothes closer to the door. It then sat on the bed and stared in a tired manner at the soldier who was watching it from the other side of the window.

The child noticed that the bullet Hawkeye had shot at it was still in its body since it had just regenerated around the object. It moved the bullet into its stomach and wondered how long it would take to digest.

The child needed to be really careful with the humans and especially this Mustang. It started feeling that its uncontrolled crying and shouting about being hurt had been really humiliating. It decided that it would not act that way again, no matter how much it hurt. It had no idea if it was capable of that but it decided to at least try. Screaming like an overreacting child and squirming like a helpless worm was not how it wanted to be seen.

It also wondered if it really was that awful to get seriously hurt or if that had only been because it had been burned. It could not say and absolutely did not want to test it, so it tried to push the thoughts away.

The child contemplated about whether it should hate humans and still came to the conclusion that there was no real reason to. The information from Envy was biased and it knew that, even if there were definite facts in the mix as well. The child thought humans were inferior – how could they not have been when they could die so easily and could not shapeshift or regenerate? Still, it did not hate them for that. It only found them less significant than itself, but it thought that humans most likely felt that way about other humans as well. It knew that Envy too considered itself more significant than the other homunculi, perhaps with the exception of Father.

The child started practising its behaviour. It imagined Mustang's questions and threats and its responses to them.

* * *

Outside the child's room, Mustang and Hawkeye met with First Lieutenant Heymans Breda and the resident commanding officer of the facility, Major Ise.

"Did you see and hear all that?" asked Mustang. Breda and Ise nodded. "Ise, can we talk privately in some room?"

"Certainly, sir. This way." Major Ise led them through a couple of corridors into a meeting room. They sat around a table.

"Whoever that thing is, I'm certain he isn't Envy. There's no way Envy would have humiliated himself by acting like that. And the way he talked was odd. Could any of you figure out whether he was lying?"

"It was obvious that he lied right after you burned him, sir, but other than that I can't say," replied Hawkeye. "Well, after those ridiculous lies he was probably speaking the truth."

"His style of speech sounded tight and practised. It could mean he was lying. On the other hand, he replied pretty quickly," said Breda.

"I can't say, sir," said Ise.

Mustang looked frustrated. "How about the claim that Envy created him? Homunculi aren't supposed to be able to perform alchemy." The others had nothing to say. "There are no alchemists in Fort Briggs. The only alchemists in North City certainly aren't specialised in creating homunculi. And neither are alchemists anywhere else. Envy would probably know how to make them. I'm not sure I can believe this, but so far it looks like Envy somehow learned alchemy."

Breda and Hawkeye made faces. "That sounds extremely perturbing. We should telephone Major General Armstrong," said Hawkeye.

"It's possible that Envy taught someone from Briggs how to make a homunculus," offered Breda.

Mustang's face grew even more disturbed. "He could make more Philosopher's Stones," he mumbled. "If he learned flame alchemy... or the alchemy of explosions... And he could amplify his alchemy naturally with his own Philosopher's Stone!" He looked frightened. "Armstrong has to destroy him. Now. There is no way we could let something that malicious and dangerous exist."

Hawkeye and Breda looked grave and agreed silently. Ise frowned a bit but said nothing. Instead, he had a question about another topic. "What should be done to that new one, then?"

Mustang opened his mouth and obviously intended to speak but did not. He sighed. "I don't know. He hasn't tried to escape yet and is apparently unable to perform alchemy, otherwise he would have tried to use it to escape already. He claims he doesn't hate humans, but that if anything sounds like a lie."

"Maybe we should keep him here," suggested Hawkeye.

"Either that or, preferably, we get rid of him before he causes any irreparable damage," continued Breda.

Ise looked mildly inconvenienced, but it was Hawkeye who spoke. "I would like to give him the benefit of the doubt at least once."

"That one time may end up being the last mistake we make," said Mustang in a restrained manner. "But even if Envy created that thing, I'm... I think I actually feel a little bad about burning him. The way he cried... it was like a child." The others did not protest. They were also a little uneasy. "I'm not quite ready to kill him if there's no real evidence of him hating us and trying to get rid of us."

"He did attack you," commented Breda.

"That... might have only been because of the pain. He was unbelievably distressed," said Hawkeye with a frown. Ise nodded.

Mustang stared at the table silently for a while. "Fine. I'm going to call Armstrong. Can I get a secure phone line here?"

"Yes, sir. This way," said Ise and got up. He led the three to the communications room and had a phone set in an adjacent private room. While Mustang waited for the line to be confirmed secure, Hawkeye and Breda checked that the room itself was secure and then stayed outside.

Eventually the line was set up and Armstrong got on the phone. "What?"

"Good afternoon sir, I must say that was quite polite – –"

"Shut up. What do you want?"

"...Is Envy still there?"

"Yes."

"Are you sure? Absolutely certain?"

"Yes."

"Then we have a bigger problem. I had my men scouting around that area where you said Envy had his little vacations, and they found a previously unknown homunculus in an abandoned farm."

"What?" her tone was mockingly incredulous.

"So either this is a ridiculous coincidence or Envy or someone in there has created a new homunculus."

"How did you come to the conclusion that it is a homunculus?"

"...I burned it and it healed."

"Also, Envy is unable to perform alchemy – or that is what YOU told me. Did you lie?"

"If I did, I did it unknowingly. I consider it more likely that someone else than Envy created it and Envy only taught that someone how to do it. So, have you lied to me about there being an alchemist in Briggs?"

"Why were YOUR men spying around in North Area?"

"...Obviously because I don't trust your handling of Envy. And you have to admit it was a good thing I didn't."

"Unless you're a filthy liar. Either way, I don't admit to anything you say."

Mustang got more serious. "I'm talking about Envy and other homunculi. I am NOT lying. Either Envy for some inexplicable reason can perform alchemy or there's someone else who can. I have the new homunculus held in a secure location. If you need testimonies from – –"

"Their testimonies are as false as yours."

Mustang was frustrated. "Sir. Someone is creating homunculi. Envy is the only one who knows how. He's too dangerous, he could make Philosopher's Stones or amplify his alchemy with his own Stone. Destroy him."

Armstrong hung up the phone.

Mustang sat still for about ten seconds and then called her again. A switch operator replied and explained that she was unavailable. After Mustang had given two minutes' worth of assurances about how dire the situation was, he managed to make the operator contact Armstrong, but the only message he got back was a literal "we are not buying anything" from her aide.

Mustang, Hawkeye, Breda and Ise went back to the room where they had initially talked.

"I explained the situation to Armstrong, but she didn't seem to believe me and now she won't talk to me."

"You didn't compliment her voice, did you, sir?" asked Hawkeye.

"Of course not, Colonel. This isn't a joking matter."

"I bet you were too polite," said Breda. Mustang just stared at him.

Ise was confused. "Er, excuse me?"

"You haven't met Major General Armstrong, right?" asked Mustang.

"No, sir."

"Well, if you ever do, remember that the only compliments she won't get angry about are those that you make of her soldiers."

"Eh, right."

"Now, what to do... I suppose we'll have to hold that new homunculus for now. I really wish I could get something intelligible out of him."

"Tell him that you'll have Envy killed unless he cooperates," suggested Breda.

"Well that's a little hypocritical since I just ordered to have Envy killed. Even if Armstrong probably ignores me." He paused and thought. "Oh well. There isn't anything better to do about this. Let's have a cup of coffee and then I'll go talk to him again."

* * *

After just less than an hour since Mustang's first visit, he and Hawkeye came back to the child's room. The child was alarmed and stood up from the bed. Mustang looked rather sour.

"I'll give an order to have Envy killed. How do you feel about that?" he asked.

The child tried to put on the demeanour it had just practised, but it was not very good at it yet. Its face twitched with concern. "I feel that you are a sadistic and illogical person. Why did you tell me that? Are you trying to make me cry again?"

"That depends. Do you feel like crying?"

Whatever the child felt, it managed to hide its emotions for now and just looked sternly at Mustang. "Stop bullying me, human."

Mustang's expression tightened. "Do you really want to get so smart-arsed with me? What if I burn you again?"

The child clearly twitched. "Then you will burn me and I will suffer."

"But I would guess you don't want that."

"Of course I do not! I could not even imagine agony like that existed! But whatever I say or do will obviously not prevent you from burning me again. If you want to burn me because of a moment's desire, then you will do so, and if you want to burn me because you think I say something wrong, then you will do so! Very little what I say or do seems to make a difference," said the child harshly.

"Oh? You're quite wrong."

"Am I? If what I say does make a difference, do tell me what I should say, because I do not understand what you want."

"The truth."

"I have been telling you the truth."

"And I have no way of finding out whether what you say really is true. Do you see the problem now?" said Mustang irritatedly.

The child frowned and seemed a little angry before it managed to make its face level again. "So... you will just torture me until I say something that you happen to find believable enough?"

Mustang glared at the child in a disbelieving manner. "I won't torture you."

"Your people abducted me from my home, put me in a little box and brought me into this room to be burned! That is torture. What have I done to you or to anyone to deserve this?" Mustang did not reply, at least right away. "...So you apparently did it just for fun. Why, why do you think this is fun?"

"I certainly don't."

"Why do you think this is something that you should do?"

"Because you're potentially dangerous."

"You are OBVIOUSLY dangerous, and yet you are not confined anywhere."

Mustang scoffed. "Fine, I may be dangerous, but I do not use my abilities dangerously and I take responsibility for my actions."

"And you think I use my powers dangerously and do not take responsibility?"

"Envy certainly acts that way."

"...Do you still think that I am Envy? Seriously?"

"No, but you've obviously been created by him, and that is quite enough to put you under suspicion of anything."

Now the child just stared at Mustang. It had nothing to say. At the same time, it could not believe that it was being judged for the actions of its creator, but based on its memories, it could see why Mustang and the humans in general would be so wary. Rather depressed, it sat back down on the bed, sighed and looked down. It had no idea how it could make the bullying humans believe that it did not share Envy's sadistic ways and was not responsible for Envy's crimes. Then again, being treated like this was incentive enough to consider that maybe Envy had been right after all. The child felt so hopeless that it felt tears starting to build up. "Please just go away." It covered its face with its hands.

Mustang and Hawkeye stood around for a moment but then left without a word.

The child lay down and sobbed a little. If they killed Envy, what would happen then? Would they just kill it too? But if that was their plan, why would they not do it right now? Why would they wait and give it even more time to try to escape? And why had they told it that they were going to kill Envy? The child looked at the door, frustrated.

The child still got its food on time. It soon figured out the schedule of its meals: it received food at 8, 14 and 20.

* * *

Mustang had barely made it back to East City headquarters when he received a call from Armstrong.

"Envy has been taken care of."

"I hope that means that you killed him."

"I have to admit there were some difficulties with that, but the last we saw of it was when it vanished in an explosion in the middle of an empty snow field."

"Could you give me a little more detail?"

"I first attempted to freeze it like I did Sloth, but its shapeshifting powers deterred that too easily. It kept changing its form and the frozen parts of its body cracked away. My soldiers shot it with explosives, but it managed to flee inside the walls. 400 kilograms was NOT its minimum weight, because it somehow managed to move through the ventilation shafts. It fled outside, which was when my soldiers shot it with a bazooka. After it exploded, we could not find it anywhere. That is enough reason to assume that it is dead."

"Well, yes... if that's true."

"Are you accusing me of being a liar?" she asked aggressively.

"You wouldn't mind if I checked this myself, would you?"

"Of course I would. How would you even check it? The homunculi leave no body behind. After they die, it is like they never existed."

"Just... send me copies of the reports, all right?"

"Hmph."

"Did you find out who had created the new homunculus? Was it Envy?"

"I'm not sure whether I believe that you have a new homunculus. Envy didn't admit to creating a homunculus, but I caught it lying. It was able to perform alchemy."

"And there's no other alchemist who could've created the homunculus for him?"

"No, but there is one person here who can do alchemy." Armstrong could hear Mustang's frightened expression and smirked to herself. "He's a hobbyist. He can reshape screws, fix pipes and heat and cool materials."

"But it's possible that – –"

"There is no way he could do something even remotely complicated, let alone create homunculi."

"What's his name?"

"Shrike. Kaine Shrike. Try not to confuse him with his father."

"There's no way to know what an alchemist – –"

"Shut up. I happen to think that you and other alchemists are untrustworthy and often too dangerous to be allowed to live, but Shrike I trust. He's a conscientious coward and not a silly idealistic hothead like you. Request a copy of his papers if you're so concerned. Is there anything else you want to know or are we done?"

Mustang did not say "I told you so."

Armstrong did not wait long for a reply. "Good." She hung up the phone.

Mustang could not help admitting that he felt relieved. Nonetheless, even if the problem of Envy had apparently been solved, he still had the new homunculus in his hands and he did not know what to do with it.

* * *

**Author's note:** Okay, I'm at a total loss. Please everybody explain to me when people's titles are supposed to be capitalised and when not! I've understood that the title is capitalised when I write "Major Armstrong" but not when I refer to "a corporal" who is generic. But what if I then refer again to "the corporal"? Should that be capitalised? How about if I refer to "the Major" who was named? How about "sir"? Does it depend whether people mean it as a name of sorts since they don't know the person's actual name or if it's used as an addendum when speaking to a superior officer? And when exactly should words like "mother" and "dad" and so on be capitalised? I'm so confused! Engliiiiish! Curse youuuuu!

Finnish would be so simple. Only people's actual names would be capitalised. The end.


	19. Confinement

Two days after the child's rather unfortunate meeting with Mustang, a private brought it a tray of food and surprisingly remained in its room. The private was a friendly-looking man in his thirties and had rather handsome features for a human. The child remembered that he had occasionally been guarding it outside the room.

"Is it okay if I stay here and keep you company?" he asked.

The child was confused, but saw no reason to not allow him to stay. And that was assuming that it even had a choice. At least the private had formulated his question as if it did have a choice. "Um, sure." It kept eating but was polite and always finished its mouthfuls before saying anything.

"Thanks." He smiled and sat down at the table. "I thought the dessert was particularly tasty today."

"Mm."

"Listen, I want to tell you that... not all humans are like Major General Mustang. I thought what he did was... well, he shouldn't have done it. It doesn't matter much that you regenerate, I could see you were in terrible pain and that was awful."

"Oh..." The child was confused. It did not know what to respond and right now it also could not help but think about whether the man was trying to somehow deceive it or not.

"Anyway, I'm Private Martin Matilda."

The child just nodded at him since it still had not come up with a name for itself and thus could not introduce itself.

"Hm? No jokes about my name?"

"Huh?"

"Almost everyone at the least smiles at my name."

"Oh..." The child made a small smile that was unnatural but no in any way exaggerated.

Matilda chuckled. "No, I didn't mean that... It's that my family name is a woman's name and it sounds funny to people."

The child looked curious. "Why is that funny? As I understand it, you have no choice with regard to your family name, is that not right?"

"Right, but that doesn't stop people from finding it funny that a guy has a woman's name, even as a family name."

The child made a tiny perplexed smile. "I don't understand that. I find that silly."

"Isn't it just? I gathered that you don't have a name yet. How come?"

"My creator did not want to name me because it thought a better option would be that I name myself so I know the name fits. But I have not come up with anything."

"...Your 'creator'?"

The child frowned at Matilda and wondered whether it should explain anything to him. However, since other people already knew what kind of creature it was, it saw little reason to not tell. "I'm a homunculus, an artificial human. Therefore I have a creator, someone who made me."

"Oh, with alchemy? But I thought doing that was forbidden... and impossible."

"I can see why you would say that, but here I am, and you obviously know I'm not a human like you."

"I guess so then! So, how about coming up with a name for you? I can make some suggestions and you can think about them and see if any of them fit."

"That would probably beat the purpose of me coming up with a name myself."

"Well, you can just take an impression. Like, if I say John, you could change that and be, um... Johnny, or something."

The child rolled its eyes a bit. "Well... I guess there is no harm in that."

"Neat." Matilda then began slowly listing names that he came up with. "Here goes: Mortimer, Jack, Trey, Bertram, Stephan, Kimball, Sydney, Willy, Wolfram, Artemis, Frederick, Cameron..."

"Hmh... Those are all men's names, are they not?"

"Well, obviously. Wait, um... are you a woman?" asked Matilda in astonishment.

"I'm a shapeshifter."

"Oh, er, right. But... You must have some kind of true form, right?"

"...In a manner of speaking, maybe."

"Well, which sex is that?"

"None."

"What do you mean none?"

"...I mean that my so-called true form has no sex."

"Ah... that's a little sad..."

"Oh? Why? If I wanted to, I could shapeshift into one sex or another or a mix. But I don't see a reason for that unless I was going to have sex in some specific way."

Matilda stared at the child, rather confused and somewhat taken aback by its direct way of expressing itself. "But... Then you don't... Or you wouldn't... I mean... Well, which sex you prefer?"

"None, I suppose. I think a simple form with nothing extraneous added is a better option."

Matilda stared at the child. "But... Why do you have long hair, then? Isn't that sort of unnecessary too?"

The child raised an eyebrow and considered the man's claim. He was right, long hair did not really serve a purpose. It then shapeshifted its hair away entirely.

Matilda stared at it. "Errr..."

"What?"

"That... looks rather, um, odd."

"Well, the hair is unnecessary, as you said. Though it does feel colder now, so maybe it does have a function. Maybe a little hair would be better." It then shapeshifted a short haircut for itself.

"That looks better."

"Looks better..." The child made its way to the corner with the mirror and changed its hair style and length several times.

Matilda felt like telling that the mirror was in truth a one-way window, but since that was supposed to be kept a secret from the child, he did not mention anything about it.

The child made its way back from the mirror with somewhat long hair again, though it was not as long as what it had started with. "That is why my hair is longer. It looks better." It sat back at the table and continued with its food.

"Mm, yeah. I guess you do look better with longer hair." Matilda held a short pause. "I bet you'd also look better if you picked a sex. Or... at least more normal."

The child frowned. "Mhm. But I like being like this. Why should I look more 'normal'?"

"Well... that way people wouldn't pay that much attention to you."

"Oh? Even you just assumed I was a man until I brought it up. I would probably not have noticed that you were only listing men's names if you had not brought my attention to your name and the reason why other humans think it is funny."

Matilda made a rather sly grin. "I still think you should just pick a sex. That's how humans are."

The child looked down at its food for a moment, and then looked askance up at Matilda. Was he saying that it should be someone else? "I am not a human. I do not care for having a sex."

"Oh, fine then. Would you like some women's names then too?"

The child was glad that the man finally discarded the topic. "Sure, go ahead."

"Well then... Lindsey, Marie, Gwendolyn, Daria, Lily, Violet, Minnie, Jenny, Sarianne... hm... Curt, Richard, Donovan, Wren..."

The child interrupted. "Is it common for people to have a common noun as a name? Like Wren?"

"Yeah. I think it's mostly women and flowers. Wren is a bird though."

"I like those kind of names more."

"Is that so? Well, let's see if I can come up with more of those... I think Moss is a name." Slowly, he came up with and listed the names. "Heather, Star, Victor, Raven, King, Iris, Lavender..."

Matilda kept on listing names even though the child did not pick any of them at the end, at least yet.

The child still did not know what to think of the private since it could not understand why he was being nice in such a specific way and wanted to talk to it. It understood basic politeness and the way that reduced the risk of violence or other unpleasantries, but beyond that it was rather clueless, most likely because Envy had not given it any information regarding that because Envy had never considered such a thing. Envy had only been concerned with very superficial politeness and did not think there was much use in being polite. The child wondered whether Envy had been polite with it and eventually concluded that it had not been, though Envy had also not been impolite toward it.

It decided that human communication was really complex and wished it was simpler.

* * *

The next day, Mustang and Hawkeye visited the child again. It was sitting at the table, shapeshifting different kinds of footwear on its feet. When the two entered, it was alarmed and looked at them in an acrimonious manner. At least Hawkeye was not pointing her rifle at it now, though she was carrying it.

"Envy is dead," said Mustang.

The child frowned deeply before making its face level again. It looked down at the empty table. "Really."

"You don't believe me?"

"Why would I?"

"Do you think I have some reason to lie?"

"Do you think I have some reason to believe you?"

"I haven't lied to you."

"How can I know that?"

Mustang looked irritated.

"Are you going to kill me?" continued the child since Mustang did not reply too soon.

"Not now."

"When then?"

"I hope never, but we shall see."

The child scoffed.

"You still don't believe me?"

"You are obviously hostile toward me, so excuse me for not taking your statement for granted. But I shall entertain you for a while by pretending to believe you. What then? Will you keep me here forever?"

"Well, that will depend on you. Are you able to function as a reasonable member of the human society?"

That shut the child up very effectively. Its eyes wide and mouth open, it lifted its gaze from the table an looked at Mustang.

"And are you able to prove to us that you will?"

The child had no idea what to reply. How cruel a joke was this? If it went with Mustang's idea and started to believe what he was saying, how long would it live in the belief that it would get out of this place until they told it that it would not, or until they killed it? And if it merely ignored the vague offer and did not even try to work with them, would they eventually give up and kill it just to be rid of it even though they had been ready to accept it?

"Give me some kind of answer. I haven't got all day."

"Uh... If... if you really were serious... then being a reasonable member of the society sounds better than staying here forever or being killed," it said a little uncertainly.

"Would you be able to live in peace with humans, knowing that we killed your creator?"

The child looked angrily at Mustang. "That was YOU. Do not try to manipulate me by claiming that all of you humans killed Envy together. That just sounds like a really poor attempt at alleviating the burden of murder by spreading it on all other humans," it said with a hint of revulsion.

Mustang seemed a little surprised. "That didn't seem to be a problem for Envy. He happily blamed every single human for everything he could come up with."

"When will you believe that I am not Envy?! Envy has its reasons for feeling like it does, and I have my own."

"Oh? What do you think was the reason why Envy felt like that?"

The child's face twitched as it started believing that it was possible that Envy was dead. "I will not answer. If you were telling the truth about its death, then there would be no point in answering."

"Well, then I'll tell you. Did you know how jealous he was of humans? He envied the way we forge truly loyal friendships and how our friends help us in the face of trouble, no matter how impossible those troubles are to solve. He wanted to take that away from us and have it for himself, but that was something he couldn't do. It's something no one can do. He hated us for that."

The child frowned at Mustang and stared at the table again for a while. It had not directly known that piece of information about Envy because that was both private and irrelevant to their relationship since neither of them was a human. Still, what Mustang had said made enough sense that the child did not question the revelation's truthfulness despite the fact that he was the one who had said that to it. "That would explain a lot of things and I can see that could be a reason why Envy created me," it said with a lower voice.

"Why would that be a reason for your creation?"

"Envy wanted a non-human friend or relative who would be there for it. That is probably my purpose..." Now it stared at the table longingly. Had Mustang really had Envy killed because it had wanted a family and a friend? Surprisingly enough, the child only felt a little angry. The emotion that dominated inside its mind right now was massive disappointment at Mustang, his incompetence and his pitiful inability to research things properly and rushing to incorrect conclusions. The child turned its eyes at Mustang again and glared at him icily. "Would you have had Envy killed if you had known this before you gave the command?" it asked, its tone as cold as its looks.

Mustang stared at the child silently for a short moment. "I wouldn't believe that for a second. But if that for some inexplicable reason were true... no, I probably wouldn't have."

The child thought that at least the man had the nerve to question his decisions, even if he still did not believe it. It turned back at the table and felt sad and alone.

"Are you planning on taking revenge on me?" asked Mustang in a surprisingly neutral tone.

Now the child raised its voice. It even placed its hands on the table in a threatening manner. "Why would I do that? None of you humans will learn anything from that. Another human would just seek revenge on me and in the end I would be dead and probably so would be you and some of your friends. What in the world would be the point in THAT?! Now you can live and learn from your mistake that I hope will haunt you to your inevitable grave. That is my revenge." It put its hands back down and looked at the table.

"That is just – –!" Mustang started arguing back, but Hawkeye took a hold of his shoulder and the Major General stopped.

"Please just go and do not come back. Send someone else to talk to me if you must, and please do not have them wave a gun at my face," said the child with a glance at Hawkeye. It crossed its arms on the table and leaned its head on its arms, face down.

Both Mustang and Hawkeye stared at it for a short moment but then exited the room without saying anything.

The child was sad and definitely felt like crying, but it decided not to cry. It could control itself enough to stop itself, even if doing that was quite difficult. Instead, it just lay still where it was for several hours. When its food was brought to it, it did not eat at all first. However, after the food had been in front of it for an hour, it reached over and started eating, not much caring that everything was cold already. As it ate, it felt so much like crying that it could not stop itself any longer. It wept and after it had stopped, it ate again, and then it wept again. It repeated the pattern until its food was gone. It then went to sleep.

When its next meal came, it did not weep again. It was over the feeling of loss. Envy might be dead or it might not be, and the child did not really have a way to know that right now.

Private Matilda came to see the child again the next day. He was slightly sombre when he entered the room. The child was sitting on the bed.

"I heard about what you and Major General Mustang talked about yesterday. I really don't know what else I could say so I'll just say I'm sorry and that I hope you'll get over it some day."

The child did not know what to say back to that. It looked at the cover on the bed.

"So, I brought something else that might help you take your mind off any sad issues. Have you ever played cards?"

The child looked at Matilda tiredly but a little curiously. "No..."

"Really? Well then, come on here, I'll teach you some games!" he said as he sat at the table.

The child felt apathetic and indifferent but joined him at the table nevertheless.

It quickly learned the rules of the first game Matilda taught it. Playing was better than doing nothing, but the game was not complex enough to take its mind off other issues.

"Why am I being held here?" it asked when they had finished a game.

"Huh? You don't know?" asked Matilda back. He seemed surprised. "Um, I don't know either. I just work here. Shouldn't they have told you that when they captured you?"

The child frowned and looked inquiring. "I have no idea why anything is happening here. I can sort of understand why they would think I am dangerous, based on what my creator has done. But that feels very prejudiced in my opinion. And if my creator is dead now, what reason do they have for keeping me here? Either they believe that I am a danger to them and they should kill me or that I am not and they should release me."

"I... would guess they're just not sure about that yet."

The child sighed.

"I'm... well, sorry. I don't understand anything about this either but I'll hope you get out soon. You seem like a pretty nice person to me."

"Are you really allowed to be in here with me? As far as I understand, humans think that guards are not allowed to be too comfortable with the prisoners."

"Hm... I don't know really. I just asked my superior officer whether I could keep you company after I saw the Major General burn you and he just said okay, if I really wanted."

"Oh. Then you don't believe Mustang?"

"Well, I don't know... I believe him, but he hasn't really said anything about you. Except that you're dangerous."

"Then you don't believe him."

"I guess, for that part. I'm not afraid since you don't seem dangerous. You don't even seem impolite, much less violent or murderous!"

"A polite person could be murderous, though."

"Well, fair enough, but you just don't seem like that."

The child was somewhat taken and made a very small smile, even if being complimented on not being homicidal was not much of an endorsement. "Um... thank you."

Matilda smiled more widely. "Aww, you're welcome. I'm glad you feel a bit better. Oh hey, I just remembered. I made a list of names that are also common nouns for you." Matilda took out a list from his pocket. "Want to hear?"

"All right."

"Well then, Angel, Ash, Aspen, Autumn, Blaze, Brook, Carter, Clay, Dale, Diamond, Drake, Harper, Haven, Hazel, Heath, Heaven, Holly, Hope, Hunter, Ivy, Lane, Lee, Meadow, Raven, Ray, Reed, Ridge, River, Rose, Rosemary, Rowan, Sage, Stone, Summer, Talon, Tanner, Tucker, Wade, Walker, Will, Willow. How's that?"

"Some of them are good... but I don't know if any of them fit me."

"Well, me neither," said Matilda with a lopsided smile. "I can look up for some more if you like."

"If you want to."

From that day on, Private Matilda visited the child almost every day. The child suspected that he only did not visit it during weekends. Despite his efforts, the child still could not decide on a name. He also brought it some more reading: novels and simple fact books.

Two days after Mustang's last visit, a new soldier who was not just another guard came to ask the child questions about the military and homunculi, and it pretended to not know the answers. Envy had tried to give the child most of its knowledge concerning the military, but the child knew that it did not know everything or understand all of what it did know. Similarly, it knew more about the homunculi than it told. No one needed to know how much it knew. The interrogator also kept asking it questions about alchemy, which it found very annoying because Envy had told it the basics of alchemy and it would have wanted to know more, but now it was stuck explaining the very simple basics to others instead and had no way to go forward and no way to practise.

At least the interrogator was more polite than Mustang and did not threaten it or pressure it. He also seemed to be as inconvenienced as the child since he had to keep asking questions to which he pretty much knew he would not get any answers.


End file.
